#by now the politics have simmered down and just the after effects can be seen on the story

[astrowarr]

(slaps the roof of my roomies zombie apocalypse au) there are so many political nuances in this bad boy

[the-modern-typewriter]

"My god." The stranger studied the protagonist, idly pinning them up against the bathroom wall. "That is incredible. You are incredible."

"I -" They didn't know exactly how they had expected the meeting to go, but it wasn't like this. "I didn't mean to startle you. The bartender gave me your change."

They shifted in the stranger's grip, which was about as effective as a mouse squirming beneath a lion's paw.

"Mm. They would, wouldn't they?" The stranger's head tilted as they wet their lips. "Wow. My own little doppelganger."

"I'm not - I'm just Riley."

"Riley," the stranger echoed.

"...And you are?"

The stranger laughed.

The two of them looked identical. It was uncanny. Obscene, in the face of the simmering hunger in stranger's face, that the protagonist would never have recognised on their own.

The protagonist shifted again. They politely cleared their throat.

The stranger smiled, honey slow. "You can keep the change. I don't need it."

"R-right." When the protagonist caught a glimpse of the stranger across the hotel bar, they had followed them to the bathroom. Not to be creepy or anything. They'd just been...curious.

"New to the city, are you?" the stranger said.

"Just passing through! Can you - can you let go of me?" It sounded like a question. The protagonist tried again. "Let go of me."

It was obvious that the stranger didn't like to be followed and didn't expect anything good from anyone doing the following. Which, fair. Still, it must have been obvious after the initial instinct that the protagonist was hardly stalking them for some untoward reason.

They'd just wanted a glimpse. To double check that their mind wasn't playing tricks on them.

The delight of discovery faded beneath the stranger's bright and wondering gaze and they rather wished that their mind was playing tricks on them.

The stranger's grip eased, mercifully, after a moment. Their palm smoothed down the protagonist's front with an eerie and less merciful possessiveness. The smile they flashed, though, was exactly the same one that the protagonist had seen a hundred times before in the mirror.

"Get a drink with me," the stranger said, and they didn't correct it into a question. "I want to hear all about you. Incredible."

It was, admittedly, incredible.

By the time they'd established no family connection, no easily apparent trick or explanation, it was late. The stranger - one Carter Eden - was charming when they wanted to be, but the protagonist couldn't shake their unease and the memory of those strong, weirdly familiar fingers fixing them in place as if it were nothing.

It explained something, though, of the looks the protagonist had been getting since they arrived. The treatment. The assumption that they were a creature of wealth, power and influence. Carter Eden was certainly that.

"Well, this was - something," the protagonist said, managing a smile. "I should get going though."

They wished now, too, that it had been a pub. Somewhere with less obvious rooms that they were obviously staying in.

"Mm." Eden was leaned towards them across the table, face cupped in one hand, intent. It might have been dizzyingly flattering in other circumstances. "This really was quite something, wasn't it? Serendipitous fate, perhaps."

The protagonist smiled again and pushed to their feet.

"You're so like me," the stranger said. "And yet...so utterly not. I just want to see everything you do." They sounded mesmerised. Intoxicated on more than the small amount of wine they'd shared. They stood too.

They were, of course, exactly the same height. Same build. Same everything, except the posture and mannerisms.

"Pleasure meeting you," the protagonist said, with a stiff politeness.

"All mine."

They woke up the next morning, with the stranger sitting in their room, watching them sleep with that same consuming curiosity.

The protagonist's belongings - wallet, ID, everything - were gone. Spirited away somewhere in the night, beyond locked hotel room doors and ordinary life.

They froze. Fury and fear swelled in their throat in equal measure.

"Good morning, gorgeous." The stranger rose, tossing them clothes that were most certainly not the protagonist's old and comfortable ones, and far more indeed like the antagonist's garments. "I'm afraid you're coming with me."

The protagonist knew then that they never should have followed the devil into the bathroom.

[hobidreams]

march 1858.

a visitor you never expected; a day you will never forget.

pairing: joseon king!yoongi x reader genre: fluff words: 1.3k contains: historical au, child!yoongi, softness historical context: korean tradition dictates that people age up at the start of the new year (Jan 1), not on their actual birthday. traditionally, they also add an extra year as they consider the baby 1 year old at birth, not 0 years old.  a/n: this drabble is sponsored by a donation to Black Lives Matter.

moonlit throne index. this is drabble four. start from the beginning?

For the entire week leading up to March 9th, as it has been for the past eight years, the palace lights up with an anticipatory hum, a buzz of excitement. Queen Jeonghui is in especially high spirits as she oversees the thorough cleaning of the grand hall and the preparation of the customary celebratory dishes, made with lavish ingredients especially imported from foreign traders. For the eunuchs, the guards, and all the palace occupants, it’s a relief to see the queen so pleased after what had happened a few months prior. Even as she cradles her left arm, hidden by a swath of silk, the smile never leaves her lips as she thinks of the prince and his impending, official tenth birthday.

You don’t pay much attention to the festivities. Or to be more accurate, you don’t have time to. As much as you’d like to pretend, the decorations aren’t for you. Anyhow, your mother has been overwhelmed with work lately as one of the few uinyeo in the palace, and as the head of them all. You are but a fledging apprentice, still learning how to diagnose and properly treat the illnesses that so easily strike the ladies of the court. If only the male physicians could ease your mother’s burden. But social convention must be followed. Even tonight, on Prince Yoongi’s official birthday, she cannot join the feast even though she has been invited personally by the queen.

“Mom, Da-ri-nim’s cramping has gone down,” you report happily, steps a little lighter as you walk over to where mother is hunched over an assortment of herbs. She’s crushing ingredients together with a mortar and pestle.

“Oh? That’s wonderful.” Mother brushes away a few strands of hair from her face. “She should be stable for the rest of the night, but we should keep an eye on her.”

“To make sure she doesn’t bleed too much?”

She smiles. “That’s exactly right.”

“Is the new medicine done yet?”

“Almost there.”

You lean against the desk, watching how the small pot of water simmers above the fire. “I reeaally hope this one works.”

“Me too. The extra amount of mugwort should be effective. Do you remember its effects?”

“Hmm. Most useful for thinning blood, increasing circulation, and…” You look hopefully at her. “Relieving muscle pain?”

Much to your relief, she nods, pride swelling in her chest. “Smart girl.”

The music outside does a crescendo then, notes floating through the cracks of the doors with sounds of laughter. The drums pound out a practiced beat, seeming to shake the ground itself with revelry. You’ve seen the dancers practicing out in the courtyard a few days earlier, and you can only imagine how lovely they must look now, all dressed up in handcrafted skirts and gauzy scarves. You wish you could see it! You’ve always loved to dance. Used to try on mom’s only fancy pink hanbok even though it was much too big for you, then spin round and round and round in front of the mirror to watch the skirt float. She’d scolded you harshly after: how could you possibly dirty or ruin a present from the king himself?! The first gift she had ever earned for her essential help with delivering the precious crown prince. But there are always more dances and performances. This is more important, and that’s okay too.

“We’ll go next year.” Mother says as if she can read your mind (or maybe you’re just bad at hiding your disappointment). “I promise.”

Before you can respond, the door slides open.

“Su-uinyeo-nim!”

“What’s wrong?”

One of the newer eunuchs stands in the frame, his face pale. “A dancer has collapsed! We didn’t want to move and bring her here, so please come with me!” He bows quickly, fingers twisted in the long folds of his sleeves.

“Understood.” Mother reaches aside for the parcel she keeps for emergencies. “Let it boil. Take care of the patients. We’re still going to celebrate after I get back, okay?” she says to you, then disappears with the eunuch.

You do as you’re told, checking on the women who lie on the beds. You replace the damp cloths on their foreheads that have become lukewarm with sweat, and help those who can up, so they can have some water. Many of them are recovering well from the ruthless winter sickness that swept through a whole group of maids; their fevers are mostly subsiding and coughs calming. Still, anything could happen.

When another noise comes from outside, you turn your head. Standing, you put one hand on the door handle and pull.

“Mom, did you forget—”

Your mouth drops slightly as you meet a dark gaze, one at your eye level and marred with a thin scar.

“W-Wangseja-jeonha!” You immediately drop into a bow, ninety degrees, with your back as straight as you can make it. You hold it for five long seconds. He’s still staring at you when you come up again. “M-May I ask why you are paying a visit here…?”

“I made Eunuch Kim sneak me away.” Despite his age, he sounds composed and mature, befitting a future king. He gestures casually beside him to where an exceedingly tall man stands, holding something covered with cloth. “Tray.”

Eunuch Kim steps forward, his cheek slightly indented from his polite smile as he takes away the covering to reveal a bowl, with silver utensils lying aside it. Steam rises immediately, transparent as it curls into the air alongside a comforting smell.

“This is…”

“Janchi guksu.” Celebratory noodles, which must have been brought directly from the feast. Undoubtedly prepared with the highest quality ingredients, and delicious. “It’s your birthday too, isn’t it?”

That was probably one of the last things you thought he’d say. Your heart squeezes; it’s a sort of weird, nervous glee at being unexpectedly seen. “T-That is—Yes! Oh, yes, it, it is!”

While you always thought it was fascinating coincidence to share the same birth date, you’d also long resigned to be overlooked by most in favor of him. Mother always brings you a new hairpin from town, and makes you savory seaweed soup in your own private celebration, and that’s enough. But now, to have the crown prince himself here! You haven’t seen him since that November night, and never this up close.

While his face remains impassive, it seems to soften at your smile. “Good. Then take this.”

You accept the tray that Eunuch Kim offers with grateful hands. You stare into the bowl with your heart pounding. “Can I ask… how did you know, seja-jeonha?”

“Mama told me.”

Your grin grows wider. Next to your mother, the queen has always been your role model. Kind, beautiful, and endlessly caring. Even that night, she had been willing to sacrifice herself for her son. And it seems the prince has learned compassion from the very best.

“I don’t know how to thank you. You didn’t have to trouble yourself, coming all this way.”

“Seja-jeonha. We only have a minute left,” the eunuch reminds in a soft voice.

The prince nods his acknowledgment. You expect him to walk away immediately, but he stays. “A king must protect and take care of his people. And… it’s a thank you. For that night.” He shifts his weight from one foot to another, almost nervous. “Eat well.” Only then does he stalk off with a swish of his opulent navy robes.

You stand there for a minute longer, watching him with admiration in your heart until your grumbling stomach makes you turn in.

Tonight, as the delicate noodles and light soup warm your body from the inside out, you make a promise to yourself. As you renew your fealty to the royal family, you add a new caveat, a second, private oath: unabridged loyalty to the crown prince, to the future king, to Min Yoongi himself.

[wreathedinscales]

Ren wakes violently, lightsaber flying to his hand, fist clenched around the worn blanket falling over his lap.

"Easy," a faceless helmet tells him. It's shiny like the rest of the stranger, polished despite its scuffed age. The room is like them: worn and serviceable.

"Who are you?" Ren snaps. His periphery tells him little else: seems like a bunk, a ship's bunk. They're not flying, though. He'd feel that, even disoriented as he is. "Tell me!"

The helmet tilts slightly to him. "If it weren't for me, you'd be dead."

"Am I supposed to believe that?"

One of the stranger's raised hands points to the wall. "Blizzard set in not too long after I brought you here. Would you like to check?"

Ren grits his teeth, saber hissing in response. "Who are you?"

"I'm a Mandalorian. Just passing through." They nod to him. "Put your laser away and we can talk."

Laser? "Are you an idiot?"

Cautiously, the Mandalorian lowers their hands and side-steps their way to what passes as a wardrobe for this tiny room. They bring out a medkit.

"I know you're." They gesture. "One of those. My armor can block it."

Ren surges to his feet and nearly collapses.

The stranger...doesn't let him fall.

"I said easy," they say, making no move to kick the now dull lightsaber away. "You're wounded."

"I can have your ship destroyed with a snap of my fingers," Ren snarls, clawing ineffectively at their pauldrons.

"Sure, kid. Come on." With terrifying ease, Ren is deposited back on the cot. "Stay down. I need to check your bandages."

"I can," Ren nearly shouts, "I am Kylo Ren, and you will show me respect!"

The Mandalorian pauses halfway to him. Ren wants to grin, simmering in anticipation for when this mighty warrior backs away and pleads forgiveness.

They reply, "Are you...a local warlord or something?"

Ren. Can't remember the last time he wasn't angry. Right now, his shock is so powerful it blocks everything out. Just for a second, but it's enough to almost, almost, feel like a reprieve from his rage.

(He doesn't want to be angry. But he also does, so much he breathes with it.)

It comes back quickly. "What did you say?"

The Mandalorian carelessly sits near Ren's ankle and opens the medkit. "I'm sorry if I've offended you. Like I said, I'm just passing through. I don't know your planet's politics."

"I'm not a local," Ren spits, "I am Apprentice to the Supreme Leader of the First Order! You are nothing compared to—"

The Mandalorian presses on the gash in Ren's leg, containing his thrashing cries with their other hand.

"This might hurt," they say.

"I'm going to kill you!"

"Uh-huh. Hold still."

()

The Mandalorian is not afraid of him.

It's not out of defiance, a front that so many of the Resistance put up. They genuinely don't know or care who Ren is. They'd seen someone they thought needed help (which he hadn't) and acted.

Ren refuses to believe he's bothered by it beyond the obvious. He will make the Mandalorian remember him.

He just has to get off this ship first. His commlink is gone, but the idiot hasn't taken his lightsaber out of the room. He very much doubts the armor can actually block a Sith's blade.

()

Except that it can. Very effectively.

"You done?" the Mandalorian says flatly, as if Ren is something stuck to his shoe.

It's very satisfying to watch him choke. Until a fibercord yanks Ren's lightsaber right from his hand, making him lose focus.

The helmet is suddenly in Ren's face. Ren hates his reflection. He looks like a scolded child. He tries fixing it, but he finds his snarl does nothing.

"Listen, kid," the Mandalorian says.

"Kylo Ren!"

"Kylo Ren. Even if you can walk on that leg, you'll be going to your death out there." The Mandalorian shoves off. "I won't let that happen."

The shock crashes back. Ren doesn't want to think about how dumb he must look.

"You...don't want to kill me."

The Mandalorian shrugs. "I have no quarrel with you. Though if you keep swinging your laser sword around, we might have a problem."

"It's called a lightsaber."

"Fine, lightsaber. You don't use it on me, I'll finish taking care of you and we'll go our separate ways."

Kylo Ren sneers. "What a good Samaritan you are."

The Mandalorian sighs. "Anyone ever tell you what a brat you are? Where are your parents?"

"What did you just say?" he roars.

"Hey, hey. I'm sorry." It sounds. Genuine? "You said you're an apprentice, right? What about your master, are they around?"

Ren leans forward. "I can take care of myself."

He calls to his saber, already picturing that fucking helmet rolling on the floor.

The Mandalorian holds on. His hand doesn't shake from resisting Ren's power.

"Sorry, Ren." That one's not genuine. "I have experience with your kind."

"Not with me."

Another, louder sigh.

Ren's saber is taken apart, crystal neatly extracted and freely allowed to answer Ren. He feels the blood drain from his face.

"I can't let you kill me," the Mandalorian says, "I've got my own kid to think of."

Ren white-knuckles his screaming kyber. "Then where are they?"

"I'm on my way back to him. I was about to send a message when you woke up. He'll understand."

Of course they assume that. Children are expected to just allow their parents to put them off.

The Mandalorian sets the saber parts in the tiny wardrobe with surprising gentleness. They put a secure lock in place and nod to themselves.

"I'll contact him now. You can borrow mine if you want, after. I'm sure your master must be worried."

Ren clenches his teeth. "Stop pretending you know nothing about me!"

"I'm not pretending."

"My Master is the Supreme Leader!"

The Mandalorian puts his hands on his hips. "I don't have anything to gain from lying to you. I don't know what this 'Supreme Leader' is, or a 'First Order.' I've never met you in my life. What I do know is that I'm going to be late to see my son." He takes a threatening step forward. "And if you aggravate that injury, I don't care what your Master thinks. I'm taking off as soon as this storm passes whether you're on board or not."

"I'd like to see you try," Ren hisses.

They stare each other down.

The Mandalorian's hip beeps. They retrieve their comm as they leave, the door closing on their affectionate "Hey, kid."

Two simple words. They echo painfully in Ren's head, until it's not the Mandalorian's voice at all, but a teasing drawl bouncing off a rust-bucket.

Hey, kid. Hand me that wrench, would you?

[chaoticpuff17]

A Dangerous Game

part 11

Masterlist

Hello, my darlings! Don’t forget to let me know in the comments what member you would like featured in my next fic after A Dangerous Game is over! Love you all! --- your chaotic puff

Namjoon had promised good behavior would bring free reign of the house, what he hadn’t told her was that it wasn’t going to be put into immediate effect.

Everything had gone downhill during their first dinner in the dining room since the night of their second meeting.

“What do you mean go back to that room?” She asked putting her utensils down as she stared him down from across the table. “You promised.”  

His eyes narrowed at her not liking the tone she’d taken with him. “You’ve been so good today, jagi. I would hate for you to ruin all that good work.” He warned continuing his meal though his grip on his own utensils had tightened.

They stared each other down. One was simmering with rage, and the other was waiting for any sort of slip up. The threat was clear as it hung in the air between them. Any wrong move on her part at this point would result in a full return to house arrest. She didn’t want to risk it, but by the same token she wanted nothing more than to fling a plate at his head. But she squashed that urge taking in a steady breath as she stood from her seat and smoothed out her skirt.

“And where are you going?” He asked curious as so what she was going to do.

“Back to my room!” She announced gracing him with a sharp smile one to rival even the most calculating of his grins.

He sighed setting down his utensils and standing from his seat as well. “I would appreciate if you would sit down, jagiya.”

“I’m afraid I’m a little tired. I think I’ll retire for the evening.” Every word was coated in a syrupy sweetness that was almost sickening. “Unless of course you have any objections?”

She knew full well that he couldn’t argue with that, not when he had so recently been the cause of her car crash. He was far too concerned with her health. Even if they both knew that she was lying, he would error on the side of caution and allow her to return to her room. He wouldn’t risk her fainting again. He wouldn’t admit it out loud, but the last time had shaken him. Seeing her crumple to the ground had caused his heart to stop for just a moment, and it wasn’t an experience he wished to repeat.

“Should I call for, Seokjin?” He asked moving over to her.

“No. I’ll be just fine with some rest. If you’ll excuse me?” She continued to smile that horribly sweet smile. It was an expression she had mastered under Marcus’ regime. It was bright and saccharine, but it never met her eyes. Those remained lifeless.

“I’ll walk you to your room.” He sighed again eyeing her carefully for any signs of real fatigue.

“There’s no need…”

“I’ll walk you to your room.” His voice held a note of finality that didn’t leave room for any more arguments so she acquiesced if only for the sake of their unsteady peace.

Once they reached her room she turned on her heal to face him with that smile again. He hated that smile. He would rather face her ire than that lifeless mask. It didn’t suit her.

“Goodnight, Namjoon.”

And before he could say anything, she had closed the door in his face.

The next morning dawned with a blanket of tension settling itself over the estate. Every member of staff knew something was wrong though no one dared to express that to the master of the house. But it was clear as they watched the frigid reception of their new madame during breakfast. Everyone had been excited for the madame’s recovery. So little had been seen of her over the course of her isolation, and they were all eager to see what kind of woman the madame was. But the tension between the two did not bode well to the other occupants of the house. A happy wife made for a happy household, and it was clear to everyone that the lady of the house was less than happy.

“Y/N….” Namjoon began sighing in frustration as he did. “This is ridiculous.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

Namjoon had to clench his jaw and take a deep breath to stop himself from snapping at her. She had maintained the most infuriatingly blasé attitude all morning. She wasn’t rude. She wasn’t ignoring him. She was just politely detached remaining breezily above everything around her. It wouldn’t have been so bad, if only there hadn’t been that spark of something mischievous in her eye that told him she knew exactly what she was doing.  

“Y/N.”

And there it was, that saccharine smile he detested so much on her. “Yes, Namjoon?”

“Don’t.” He snapped slamming his chopsticks down. “Don’t do that. Don’t hide behind that mask.” She quirked an eyebrow at him but didn’t say anything. “It doesn’t suit you, jagi.”

“There are a lot of things that don’t suit me. Being here just happens to be one of them.”

“Jagi,”

“You could rectify everything by just sending me home. That would suit me very well.”

“That isn’t going to happen.” He growled.

“You can’t blame a girl for trying.” She sighed setting aside her won utensils and taking a sip of her tea. “Do I actually get free reign today, or should I assume free reign really just means meals in the dining room and walks around the garden with you?”

He leaned back in his chair debating whether or not he should release her onto the estate. The stubborn set of her shoulders told him that she would only keep up her passive aggressiveness would only continue if he made that his definition of free reign, but he had his ways of keeping her just as firmly under watch around the estate as she was in her rooms.

“Of course you’ll be given free reign of the estate, jagi, but you will have to have a guard with you at all times. For you own safety, of course.” A small smirk pulled up the corners of his mouth as he watched the frown overtake her features.

“A guard? You never mentioned anything about a guard.”

“I have my fair share of enemies. It’s for your own safety. Jungkook will accompany you while I’m not with you.”

And just like that her mask of detachment melted away replaced with a look of utter disbelief. “A babysitter. You’re giving me a babysitter?”

“For your own good, jagi.”

“It’s either a guard returning to your room. What’s it going to be, jagi?” He asked allowing himself a smile. It wasn’t a deal she would refuse, and he knew that.

“Fine, a babysitter then.”

“Excellent! This is Jungkook.” He said motioning to a young man who had only just entered the room, and Y/N had to stop and do a double take.

He was young, so very young. While he was tall and broad, clearly very strong, he was still so young. She wanted to sweep him up and take him out of here, far from Namjoon and his whole sordid business. She had been young when she’d gotten involved in this mess of a world, and it pained her to see someone so young here. It didn’t help that he had wide doe eyes that screamed of a kind soul.

“Jungkook, this is, Mrs. Kim.” Namjoon introduced motioning to the woman who was still staring at the young man in shock.

“I’m not your wife.” She snapped at him before turning a far kinder eye on the young man. “You can call me, Y/N. It seems will be spending a lot of time together.” The last part was said with an annoyed glance in Namjoon’s direction.

“Mrs. Kim, will be fine.” Namjoon groused.  

The poor boy was looking between the two of them with wide eyes unsure which of the two he should be listening to. Namjoon was his boss, but technically so was she. She was the lady of the house and would have far more contact with him on a day to day basis given his new job.

“You can call me whatever would make you the most comfortable.” She said gently, seeing the conflict on the poor boy’s face.  “Okay?”

He nodded gracing her with a smile that was too infectious not to return. They’d get along fine, but he would be a hindrance to her scoping out the gardens for a path of escape. But she should have expected this. Namjoon was always a step ahead it seemed. She’d have to find a way around him.  She’d have to play along for now.

“Well, as lovely as sitting her with you is, I think I’ll go explore. I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had the time to see the house yet.” She smiled sarcasm layering each word as she stood from her chair. “Shall we, Jungkook?” She asked moving towards the door.

“Just a moment, jagi. There’s something I’d like to show you before you avoid me for the rest of the day.”

She paused turning to face him again. “I really don’t think that I can handle any more of your surprises. The overwhelming majority of them have been…” She stopped, searching for the right word. “Unpleasant for me. Besides you’re a very busy man. I’m sure you have work to do.”

“I’ll be working from home today, jagi.” He smirked watching her smile fall.

“How lovely.”

And at that, she had to admit defeat. There would be no avoiding him, not this time at least. She knew this was a probationary period. Namjoon didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her, and she couldn’t really blame him for that, though it did make her life more difficult. She had a known history of betraying men in his position. She wouldn’t trust herself either if she was him, so she’d have to behave and avoid any suspicion of her plans of escape until Namjoon no longer suspected her of trying to do just that.

He stood up coming around the table to stand beside her, placing a firm hand on the small of her back. “Shall we, jagi.”

“If we have to.”  She sighed reluctantly allowing him to guide her through the hallways with Jungkook trailing behind like an oversized shadow.

They stopped outside of a set of doors made from a dark wood, almost black, and glass, and she had to turn to him in confusion.

“You wanted to show me a room?”

“It’s a room for you, jagi.” Namjoon explained. “You can think of it as a private parlor.”

She stared up at him trying to decide if he was serious or not. But she couldn’t find anything in his face to signal that he was anything but serious. “The last time you gifted me a room wasn’t exactly a pleasant experience.”

He chuckled. “I think you’ll like this one much better.”

“You’re not planning on locking me in this one right?” It was unfortunately a rather real concern for her at this moment. She wasn’t sure what would set Namjoon off and have him send her back to her rooms for another stint of house arrest. “Because glass doors aren’t the most secure if that’s what you’re planning.”

“No. No one will be locking you in this room. It doesn’t have a lock, jagi.”

He opened the door revealing a small room the main focus of which was the shiny black baby grand situated within it bathed in the natural light that flooded the room from the windows that had a lovely view of the gardens. There were some comfortable looking chairs and an ottoman by the windows, and one wall was a set of shelves housing books and knick knacks. She hated to admit it, but she loved it.

“No one will bother you in this room without your permission.”

“Except you.” She pointed out dryly.

“Except me.” He agreed snaking an arm around her waist. “There is a library in the house of course, but these books are for you, for this room.”

She broke away from him her eyes fixed on the piano as she trailed her fingers across the keys.  “How did you know I played piano? That couldn’t have been in the file.”

“I have my ways.” He grinned watching her take a seat at the bench. “When you get bored, you fidget, jagi.”

“You knew I played piano because I fidget sometimes?” She asked looking up at him in disbelief.

He picked up one of her hands delicately playing with her fingers. “You’ll move your fingers in a pattern, like you’re playing a song only you can hear.” He explained allowing her to pull her hand away. “Do you like it?”

She wanted to say no if only to wipe the stupid grin off his face, but the truth was she loved it. She missed the feel of the keys beneath her fingers, and it would give her something to do. Namjoon hadn’t allowed her a phone or a computer to keep her occupied, for good reason. He wasn’t stupid, but it left her with fewer distractions than she would have liked in the house. She was living like some sort of Victorian house wife only with nicer amenities.

“It’s a beautiful instrument.” It wasn’t exactly agreeing, but it wasn’t disagreeing either.She refused to give him the satisfaction. But she did love the piano.

 “Is this a Bosendorfer?” She asked running a tentative finger over the name embossed above the keys in awe. “These cost a fortune.” She breathed out in disbelief, looking up at him with wide eyes. “It had to be $500,000, and that’s at the low end!”

She couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that the man had paid a small fortune for a piano. While it was a top of the line instrument, she never would have paid that much for an instrument. She had never even been this close to piano this expensive. It was utterly insane to spend that much on a piano.

“Only the best for you.” He smiled only to receive a swift smack across the arm from her.

“Are you insane? How could you spend a small fortune on a piano?” The look of absolute incredulity on her face clearly conveyed just how stupid she found him, found this. “You could have gotten a Yamaha for a tenth of the price, and it still would have been a perfectly good instrument.” Standing on by the door Jungkook had to choke back his shock. Never had he seen anyone scold his hyung in such a way, let alone dare to lay a hand on him, and Namjoon let her. “I’m not a concert pianist. I don’t need a piano that costs more than my life is worth.”

She raised a hand to smack him again, but Namjoon snatched her by the wrist, his eyes narrowed dangerously.

“Never,” He hissed anger pouring out of him in waves. “Never say that again. Do you understand me?”

part 12

[chaseatinydream]

sly san who sacrifices (v) || c.s (atz)

➳ pairing: reader x choi san (ateez)

➳ word count: 3849

➳ genre: badboy au; fluff; angst

➳ synopsis: to the school, he may be a bad boy, the worst of the worst, but to you, he’s choi san, father of three cats, your best friend and ultimately, the boy you’re in love with.

>>>

Phone in hand, you run for the club as fast as you can.

Your feet slap against the wet pavement, little ripples in the puddles of rain left in your wake as you rush towards your destination, eyes glued to the glowing screen of your phone, fixed firmly on that tiny blinking red dot. Your legs are burning from the expected strain of them, but you don’t let up till you’re at the main entrance of the building that San is at.

Neon strobe lights hurt your eyes and you can already hear the raucous timbre of the disco music being blasted inside, the sound reverberating out onto the street outside. You spot the to be party goers mingling behind the red rope, chattering excitedly and dressed to the nines in killer outfits that shine brighter than your future and probably cost more than your college education.

This is definitely not your scene.

Swallowing, you glance down at yourself… you hadn’t really been thinking straight when you’d left the house, you’re dressed in a simple pair of shorts and a tee, nothing too scrappy but definitely not anything suitable for a night out at a club. A groan leaves you and you stare at the daunting sight before you once again, chewing nervously at your bottom lip as you contemplate turning back… and maybe just confronting San another day…

But then you snap back to your senses and give yourself a little slap, because what if this is your last chance? What if after tonight, San tells you he doesn’t want to speak or see you anymore? As unrealistic as it sounds, as irrational as your fears are, if there’s even the slightest chance it could happen, you’re not taking it – Choi San is worth more than your pride.

So you gather your courage, square your shoulders, and march to the main entrance at very front of the line.

Instantly, the mindless chattering all around you falls silent, so silent you could hear a pin drop on the wet asphalt. Panic and just sheer awkwardness crawls over your introverted skin, you weren’t made for places like this! But you force your unease down and meet the bouncer in the eye, he’s a hulking mass of steely muscle with a glint in his eye that almost scares the shit out of you literally (and probably would have if you hadn’t remembered that you had a mission to accomplish here).

He looks you up and down with a dismissive eye, barely needing to incline his head, he’s so tall. Then he leans down the slightest bit to look you directly in the eye with a near frightening stare, muscles in his neck rippling. “The end of the queue is over there, little girl.”

You swallow involuntarily, a bead of sweat running down the back or your neck and sliding down your clothes, the weight of everyone’s gazes on your back is highly uncomfortable but you ignore it in favour of keeping your gaze even and your voice steady. “I’m here to find a friend.”

“I don’t care what your reason is, in case you didn’t hear me the first time, the back of the queue is there.” The bouncer enunciates more slowly for you this time, as if you’re the one who’s drunk. “I can’t let you in unless the queue is gone, kid. There are plenty of people who want to get into this club who’ve been out here waiting since dusk.”

Your fingers twist in the hem of your shirt from nerves as you desperately try to think of a way out, unsure of what else you could do to make the man let you in. Glancing back at the queue, you’re horrified to see that it stretches around three blocks and disappears down a street, further than your eye can see. Waiting isn’t a viable option, but you don’t really have another choice unless it’s…

You force a polite smile on your face to mask the sheer panic you feel and meet the bouncer in the eye; he does not look the least bit amused. “I’m looking for Choi San.” You manage to say without bumbling like a complete fool, but using San’s name does seem to have its intended effect.

The bouncer’s eyes widen imperceptibly in surprise, just enough for you to notice up close. Then his eyebrows pinch together and his mouth pulls downwards in an unamused scowl. “It’s impossible for a person like you to know Choi San. Don’t lie to me, kid.”

You dig the bracelet out of your pocket and shove it in his face, from the way his lips part with a little intake of breath you know he must have seen it before and part of you is… happy... that he recognises it, for some strange reason. “I’m here to return his bracelet to him and then I’ll get out of your hair. Now, are you going to let me in or not?”

You’re not used to being so confident and out there, but there’s a rush of adrenaline flowing through your veins right now from the anticipation. The bouncer’s eyes narrow and for a long moment, you hold his sharp gaze evenly, unwilling to back down till he lets you in.

He backs down first with a sigh, moving towards to the rope that holds the door closed, unhooking it and ushering you inside. Behind you, you can hear angry protests of the people standing in the line, but you ignore them in favour of stepping into the club, eager to get to where San is.

The bouncer grabs your wrist with a warning glare and you whirl around to stare at him in confusion. “If something happens to you in there, missy, it’s not on me. Don’t get into any trouble and get out as fast as you can.”

You grin at him. “Thanks.”

Then you duck inside before he can say anything else.

Immediately, all five of your senses are assaulted by loud noises and bright lights coming from every direction. Bright purple neon juxtaposed against cool black leaves your eyes reeling from the colour contrast, the smell of smoke, sweat and even more alcohol so heavy and thick in the air you can taste it on your tongue. Biting on your lower lip in an attempt to remain calm in the midst of a mass of sweaty, gyrating human bodies, you stand on tip toes and try to search the dark, flickering room for San.

It proves to be a near inhuman feat. Groaning, you pull out your phone and search the map once again, sure enough, your little blue dot has overlapped with San’s red one to form a blinking purple circle, indicating that he is indeed here at this club… but where is he?

“Hey, little missy. This doesn’t look like your scene.” A voice comes from behind you and you jerk in surprise, whirling around to see someone standing there against the wall, exuding such an air of casual confidence that you can’t help but be blown away by it. His hair is blond and tousled into waves, held away from his forehead by a black bandanna to show off beautiful, dark eyes that remind you of sweet, sweet danger. Every instinct goes on high alert instantly and you actually find yourself taking a step back to take him in, he’s dressed in an all black ensemble that’s simple and stylish at the same time.

He meets your eyes with a smirk that you, for some reason, don’t find sleazy and cocks his head to the side playfully, teasingly. “What are you doing here dressed like that, darling?”

You’re on guard around him, tense, and he can see it, he enjoys it. He hasn’t moved an inch but you feel like you’re the one who’s been backed into a corner like a trapped animal, dangerous tension sparking between the two of you as you meet each other’s eyes.

“I’m here for a friend.” You spit out, suddenly desperate to get away from this man that practically oozes danger and appeal all at once. There’s a look in his eye that makes unease bubble in the pit of your stomach and when he takes a step forward, you actually flinch, every muscle in your body getting ready to run.

“Oh? Where is he then?” The man continues stepping closer and closer, and you practically freeze on the spot when he comes within an arm’s length of you. You can feel his hot breath against your cheeks, smell the slight scent of cologne and smoke clinging to his warm skin, feel the heat radiating off him. You don’t even realise you’re moving backwards till you’re backed into the wall, so completely taken by the sheer intensity of his gaze.

He leans in close but never quite touches you, only letting his words brush your bare skin as one hand comes up beside your head, he’s too close for your liking, too seductive than what you can deal with. “Why don’t we leave this place, darling, just you and me– ”

You’re about to cut him off mid-sentence politely, saying that you really need to look for your friend, but he never gets a chance to finish his sentence.

“Get the hell away from her, Wooyoung!”

Your eyes fly open in surprise at the sound of that voice and in the next second, the man is ripped away from you violently and thrown against the wall to your side. Your hands fly over your mouth to prevent the shout of horror from escaping you, but the blond doesn’t seem the least bit fazed at the sight of your best friend pinning him to the wall by the neck.

“What the hell were you doing to her?” San snarls venomously, digging his forearm into the blond’s throat. The blond simply looks down at him with a cocky grin, completely unrepentant as he shrugs. “What does it matter to you?”

San’s face twists in fury at those words frighteningly quick, you feel every drop of blood drain from your face when he raises a fist–

“San!” You cry out, running to his side and yanking on his arm as hard as you can. You’ve never seen San like this, so dark and filled with rage that it almost scares you. “He wasn’t doing anything to me! Stop it!”

San hesitates, fingers clenching and unclenching as he considers your words, the impulsive white hot rage burning behind his eyes simmering ever so slightly. Then he rips his hand from the blond and storms out of the club, leaving the blond rubbing the bruises on his throat with an exaggerated sigh.

“I’m sorry!” You bow once quickly and turn around to chase after San before he can disappear before your eyes again.

The blond sighs at the mess around him and gestures for all the onlookers to get back to their business, making his way over to the bar counter and seating himself on one of the seats there. “Some ice please, Mr Bartender.” He fingers the bruise at his adam’s apple with curiosity, an amused smile tugging on his lips. “I haven’t seen San-ie this worked up since we got expelled from our old school. It’s rather fun to watch him, isn’t he?”

“You shouldn’t have provoked him like that, Wooyoung-ah.” A smooth baritone tells him dryly as he slides a mojito over to him with a disapproving frown. Wooyoung merely grins as he scoops out two ice cubes and holds them to his throat, feeling the cold numbing the ache there, but the adrenaline he feels rushing through his body right now makes it so worth it. “You knew who she was to San, don’t lie to me. It’s like you’re trying to get yourself killed.”

“If I hadn’t done that, that coward would have tried to escape the club. I saw him moving towards the back doors when she came, so I just put on a little show for him to watch. It worked.” Wooyoung shrugs, raising the glass to his lips and taking a mouthful of his drink. Then he yelps and spits it into the potted plant next to him as fast as he can, mouth puckering uncontrollably. “That was the sourest thing I’ve tasted my entire life! What the hell, Yeosang? We’ve been friends for four years and this is how you treat me?”

Yeosang snorts as he wipes his glasses down with a clean cloth, shaking his head. “It’s precisely because we’ve been friends for four years that I’m doing this. You need to stop living so on the edge, it’s going to get you dead in a ditch one day.”

Wooyoung simply shrugs. “I’ll be fine.” Then he winces and presses the ice cubes a little more firmly against his skin, muttering under his breath. “If that little shit doesn’t get back together with her by tomorrow morning, I’m going to wring his neck for him, the fool.”

Yeosang looks over at his friend from behind the counter and rolls his eyes, but there’s a good-natured smile on his lips.

“San!”

Outside, you chase after San into a dark alleyway behind the club, before he can take another step you grab his wrist firmly with both hands and yank him backwards. He nearly stumbles at the force of your insistence, unbalanced from drink and alcohol, but finally turns around to face you, head hanged and not quite meeting your eye, clearly uncomfortable.

“What were you doing here?” San mumbles, words slightly slurred and barely loud enough for you to hear. “Weren’t you supposed to be studying at home with…” He falters for a moment and you frown in confusion, how has he forgotten the name of his own friend?

“Seonghwa and I were studying, but you were acting weird this morning so I went over to your house to ask you what was going on! Claude told me you weren’t at home so I came over to find you myself, only for you to almost get into a fight with someone else–”

San snorts, slumping against the wall with his eyes closed as he rubs his temples. “Wooyoung will be fine. That little bastard knew what he was doing the whole time, edging me on… it was a smart move, I’ll concede…”

You pause for a second. Wooyoung, Wooyoung, Wooyoung… the name sounds familiar… then it hits you. Your eyes widen and you stare at San in shock. “Isn’t Wooyoung that best friend of yours? Are you drunk? You nearly killed him! He didn’t even do anything to me!”

San’s face darken at your words, rising to his feet and lurching forward to stand dangerously close to you. But unlike with Wooyoung, you don’t feel the least bit of fear – San would never allow himself to hurt you, drunk or otherwise. “What the hell were you doing in a place like this, you idiot? What would you have done if Wooyoung wasn’t just playing around and if I weren’t there? Don’t you know you could get hurt?”

“But you were there.” You fire back, insistent. “That’s why I went there. I want to be where you are, is that so wrong?”

San groans, dragging a hand down his face. “The kind of places I go to are the places you shouldn’t be going to! Stay away from me, alright?”

But you’ve had enough of his nonsense and yank the bracelet from your pocket, shoving it in his face. His own eyes widen at the sight and he tries to snatch it from you, but you jerk it out of his reach and shove it back in your own pocket fiercely. “Is that why you took it off, San? I thought we had a promise! Best friends forever, remember?”

You’re furious, but every trace of anger evaporates in the next second, you’re completely stunned when you see a tear escape San, one at first, than two, then more and more, until San’s head is hung and you can’t see his eyes anymore, tears streaking down his cheeks and dripping to the ground. Horror overtakes you and you step forward, gripping his arm tightly. “San! San, what happened–”

Before you can say anything else, San yanks you into his chest and buries his face into your shoulder, trying to stifle his sobs. You’re still upset with him, but for now you just wrap your arms around him, the charms on your own wrist jingling. It’s not like San to be this emotional, you think worriedly… he must have had a lot more to drink than what you had thought. Then he speaks.

“I can’t belong to you anymore.” He mumbles into the crook of your neck brokenly, warm trails running down your shoulder. You utterly confused at his strange words, but then he continues and then you finally get it. “Seonghwa’s so much better for you, such a better person, he’s nice, he’s sweet, he’s kind… I want the best for you, I really do, but why can’t I stop selfishly loving you and just give you to him instead?”

Oh.

Oh.

You don’t know what to feel for a second, every thought has fled your mind and you don’t know what to say, left wordless. San likes you. Choi San actually likes you. And he thinks you like Seonghwa.

This fool.

Your lips work to form words that you’re not even sure of, but before you can, you feel San slump against you, his weight resting on your shoulder and it’s all you can do to keep him upright, you can feel his snores against your skin. You don’t know whether to laugh or cry, instead you settle on doing both, a happy, weak chuckle escaping you as a single tear rolls down your cheek.

“Tell me that again when you’re sober, pabo.” You press a kiss to his temple and turn towards the mouth of the alleyway, pulling San along with you, his warm body pressed against yours. You hear San mumble drunkenly “morning?” under his breath, half asleep and completely knocked out, but you take another step forward, heart overflowing with emotions in this dark night.

Just until next morning.

You can wait that long.

The next morning, San’s eyes blink open, only to be pummeled in the face by a massive headache.

“Ow...” He groans, hunching over on the bed as he presses his fingertips against his forehead, it’s throbbing, alright. Just exactly how much did he drink last night? He clearly had one too many... had Claude driven him back?

Squeezing his eyes shut, he tries to remember the events of the night before... he recalls drinking at the bar with Wooyoung and Yeosang, his shock at seeing you enter the club, searching for someone who could only be him... He remembers trying to run away, seeing Wooyoung brazenly flirting with you and making you feel uncomfortable, red filling his vision and then...

What?

What had happened?

You.

Where were you?

Panic crashes into him and he jumps out of bed as fast as he physically can, bare feet touching the wooden floorboards of your room... your room... San’s brain stops working altogether as he gapes at his surroundings... a vase of spring daffodils he had given you a few days ago at the desk... framed photographs of him, you and Seonghwa on the walls... your biology textbooks on the shelves...

A jingling noise catches his attention and he raises a hand to stare at his wrist in complete and utter shock. It’s his charm bracelet, the one with a bell, around his wrist.

How did that get there? He clearly remembers leaving that with Claude before he left the house... unwilling to look at it again...

He looks down, and he’s shirtless. He looks around. It’s your room. He looks down at himself again.

He’s still shirtless.

San screams.

“What happened?” You burst into the room, holding a spatula menacingly and wearing a worried expression on your face. San only screams louder, yanks the blanket up to his chest and wags a shaking finger at you, looking positively horrified. “I... We... Room... Bed-”

“No, we didn’t sleep together, idiot, I took the sofa.” You roll your eyes and step over with three quick steps to gently press a kiss to his cheek. San immediately halts all movement altogether, becoming as still as a statue with comically wide eyes and a mouth hanging wide open. He doesn’t even move when you step out of the room, and a little part of you feels satisfied that you’ve finally managed to get him back for all those times he’s teased you before.

When you finally return with a tray of warm soup, a glass of warm water and some Advil, San is still standing there, blankly staring into space with one hand pressed to his cheek. You tell him to sit and he does, staring at you in shock the whole time.

“Here.” You pass him the cup and the pills and he swallows them with a gulp of water, shaking his head to regain his bearings. When he looks at you once more, you smile warmly at him with a little, knowing glint in your eye that honestly frightens him a bit.

“How did I get here?” San manages to croak out, his throat raw from the alcohol the night before. You grin a little cockily at him and his heart stutters in his chest, you seat yourself opposite him and take his hand in yours.

San’s eyes widen slightly, you’re behaving uncharacteristically forward with him today. It takes him by surprise but you don’t seem the least bit fazed, instead leaning even closer to meet his eyes with the biggest, brightest grin on your face.

Everything is going into overdrive, he thinks, slightly dazed.

“Someone confessed to me last night.” You whisper confidentially into his ear, eyes so bright and smile so positively radiant that he can’t help but feel happy for you, even though he absolutely despises what this means: Seonghwa must have confessed to you yesterday while the two of you were studying... and he... and he...

You continue rambling with a grin and San allows himself to wallow in his own grief for a moment while you’re distracted. “I’m so happy, you know! Because I’ve liked him secretly for such a long time, but I thought he didn’t like me back... Hey, San! Are you happy for me?”

San snaps back into reality, forcing a smile on his face that he hopes passes for genuine as he nods slowly, eyes downcast. “Yeah...” He can’t meet your gaze right now.

Then, all of a sudden, you smile at him, intertwining your fingers with him and raising your interlocked hands for him to see, your bracelets touching. Your eyes find him, determined and burning with intensity, and his breath leaves him for a moment at the latent fire in your gaze.

“San, would you be mine?”

San chokes.

[higuchimon]

[fanfic] The Wild Raptor

Geise checked his traps and nodded in pleasure at the sight of the Wild Raptor struggling, legs bound together by a thick, tough rope, snapping and snarling.  he expertly slid the muzzle over the creature's head, making sure not to get his hands too close to the sharp claws or teeth.  This one looked fantastic, extremely robust and strong, and certainly worth quite a lot of coin.

Not everyone could make their way in this world the way that he could.  Geise didn't remember the world that had been before.  He'd heard stories about it, of course.  Everyone had.  But the world that he knew was one where he could and did make his way by capturing and selling spirits and animals to those who would pay a high price for them. 

He reached out and patted the Wild Raptor on the head.  "Don't worry.  You're going to be sold to someone who'll take very good care of you."

The growl the Wild Raptor delivered wasn't very loud, thanks to the muzzle, but Geise didn't care.  He wrapped a net around his prize and dragged him back to his base.  He'd heard that Brron was in the market for a pet for his sons and Geise looked forward to the amount of reward that he'd get for this. 

So the sooner he got there, the better.

Kenzan wasn't even remotely close to happy.  He tried to chew the muzzle off but he couldn't get a good grip on it, and with the rest of him bound with rope and restrained by powerful netting, there wasn't much else that he could do. 

This wasn't how his day was supposed to go.  He wanted to enjoy running through the woods, doing a little hunting for lunch, and maybe finding a cool rock he could take back home.  But he'd found himself tied up like this and that put a very bad end to all of those plans. 

He understood everything that the hunter said, of course.  That didn't mean that he liked or wanted to hear it, but he understood it, and he wasn't happy about it.  He tried to claw at any part of the restrains he could, but he couldn't get his jaws on anything.  All he could do was hang there, being extremely annoyed.

All right,  he told himself.  Can't get away right now.  But once I'm wherever this guy wants to take me, I can explain to whoever it is and go home!  Being a shape-changer had a lot of side effects.  He didn't just need to eat nearly raw meat on a regular basis - he could and did speak to humans.  He'd never spent much time around them, not since he’d left his home village before the age of ten, but he knew how to speak their language.  At least one of them.  So he'd talk to whoever this was and hope that they spoke his language and would let him go.

Only the longer the trip went on, the more he stated to wonder if that would happen.  He heard a few words, mostly to the effect of 'Brron' and that didn't give him a good feeling at all.  Everyone knew that name.  Very few people liked it.

As far as Kenzan could tell, he'd been Geise's prisoner for about two weeks before they finally arrived at Brron's castle.  He'd lost weight and muscle tone and there were plenty of bruises from the top of his head to the tip of his tail.  In all that time he'd never been allowed to change back human - Kenzan wasn't even sure if Geise knew he could do that.  He didn't want to tell him either.  Who knew what the hunter would do if he knew he had a shapeshifter captive?

By now he'd been clapped inside of a portable cell.  The muzzle still remained wrapped around his jaws, though it was removed a few times a day so he could be fed.  It wasn't very good food; more like pet food than anything else.  But Kenzan ate it.  He didn't have a lot of options. The restraints kept him from getting away. 

Truth to tell, he wasn't feeling nearly as feisty as he had the day that he'd been captured.  All of the energy he'd not been able to burn off still festered inside of him, and he'd never wanted some raw meat as much as he did right now.  If Brron's kids weren't careful, they'd end up on his menu.  He hadn't ever eaten people before, but the hungrier he got, the more enticing it seemed.  The longer he stayed in his raptor form, the worse it got too.

He closed his eyes and rested as they drew closer to the castle.  He could smell a lot of strange scents around.  Humans and monsters of all kinds, none of which he recognized, but he knew them for what they were regardless.  There were other scents as well - including well-cooked meat.  His stomach grumbled and he twitched harder, claws flexing.

Kenzan couldn't name everything that he smelled here.  As they arrived in the castle himself, he heard noises, voices talking to one another and some of them to the hunter, Geise.

"I've brogue something I think Brron's sons are going to enjoy. For the right price, of course."

That didn't surprise Kenzan in the slightest.  Geise had told him that more than once over the last couple of weeks.  But now he heard another voice answering.

"A Wild Raptor.  Interesting."  A gentle hand rested against his side and Kenzan opened his eyes to stare at whoever it was.  This wasn't someone he recognized. The hand was a bit chilly, and pale blue eyes stared at him before she turned away.  "I will inform Brron-sama of your arrival."

She swept away, tiny snowflakes falling in her wake.  Kenzan slowly sat up the best that he could and looked around.  They were in some kind of a reception area - a room that had only a few chairs for furniture, tapestries on the walls and rugs on the floor, and one single wide window letting in the sunlight.  There were a few others who weren't him or Geise there, but no one seemed that interested in him.  Geise lounged on one of the chairs, feet up on another one, and Kenzan suspected that he was busy counting out how he'd spend all of his money once he had it.

Footsteps sounded - a quick, firm stride.  All of the locals turned toward the door at once, as a trio of young people entered.  All three were male, and two of them looked so much alike, they had to be twins.  The third one stood a bit shorter than the twins, and was a bit more average in coloring, brown to their blue, but he exuded so much more presence that every eye in the room came to him at once.

Even Kenzan's. His tail lashed a little; he wasn't sure if he liked the feel of any of them.  This one regarded him out of brilliant golden eyes, eyes that spoke of a simmering rage just out of sight, before he turned to the other two.

"He might be useful,"  he said.  "Wild Raptors are fast and hungry - this one's been kept pretty badly, though."

Geise set his feet on the ground and pulled himself to his feet, grinning widely.  "It's not that bad.  Throw some food at it and let it run around for a while and it'll do anything you tell it too."

The three turned towards Geise and Kenzan wondered how anyone could look into those six eyes and still walk out upright and unafraid . Even he wasn't sure if he could, and he thought at his best he could rip any of them apart.  But Geise either didn't notice or didn't care if he did.

"So you're the one who brought him here,"  the golden-eyed one declared, arms crossed over his chest.  "And I suppose you want some money for him."

"That's how this works, boys,"  Geise agreed, smiling in a way that made Kenzan want to shred him on the spot.  "I get you what you want and you give me what i want."

The three of them exchanged glances again.  One of the blue-haired ones came closer to Kenzan, regarding him quietly, before he glanced back to his twin and nodded.  Kenzan wasn't sure if he would have noticed that if he weren't so close. 

Then all three pivoted as clawed feet sounded in the hallway outside and Brron himself, Mad king of Dark World, entered the room.  the locals all bowed down at once, while his three sons nodded politely.  Geise made no gesture of respect at all.

"He brought us a Wild Raptor,"  the golden-eyed brunet reported, gesturing to Geise, "and wants you to pay him." 

Brron swung his head from his children to Geise, then stalked over to the hunter.  "And what makes you think I'm going to pay you a single coin instead of taking what my children want and tossing you into the arena?  Hunters know something about fighting, don't they?"

"Because it would be easier to pay me and have me go away than it would to put me in there,"  Geise replied lazily. "I can go be someone else's problem."

Brron looked almost convinced.  Kenzan's. talons scraped against the bars of his cage and he snarled as best he could.  The mere idea of Geise casually leaving, with or without a huge pile of money, after the last couple of weeks infuriated him! 

The twin closest to him regarded him again, then murmured something to the other two.  The brunet considered something, then stepped closer to Brron and whispered.  Brron chuckled and ran skeletal fingers through the brunet's hair.

"My dear Juudai.  Such a chip off the block you are.  Truly, your father's son."  He patted Juudai on the shoulder, then turned towards Geise.  "Instead of paying you right away, we're going to play a game of Juudai's devising.  If you can make it to the borders alive, then you can escape with your life, and we'll have a substantial amount of gold sent to you."

Geise frowned, tensing up.  "And if I can't?"

"Oh, I think you can guess at what will happen then."  Brron waved one hand.  "Now you should get moving.  You don't have a lot of time."

Kenzan hadn't ever seen anyone run so fast or look so terrified when they did.  He didn't have much time to savor it, though, as the muzzle around his jaws and the ropes and net binding him started to be unbound.  The cage was opened and he all but fell forward, raising his head and sniffing around curiously.

"He definitely needs something to eat,"  Juudai mused, regarding him.  "I think Wild Raptors eat raw meat, don't they?"

The one of the twins that had been near him all this time nodded slowly.  "But I think this one might have his own thoughts on what he wants."  He turned back to Kenzan.  "Don't you, shapeshifter?"

Kenzan tensed at once, eyes darting this way and that, searching for the quickest way out of there.  He so seldom spoke to humans and never, ever told them what he was.  Not after what happened when he was younger. How could these know about him?

"Are you sure?"  Juudai asked, regarding Kenzan thoughtfully.  "He looks a little scrawny for a shapeshifter.  Don't they take better care of themselves?"

Kenzan's head snapped around at once.  "Because I haven't had any proper food in weeks!"  He snarled.  Then he blinked - he'd given himself away.  All three of them looked some variety of smug.  The one closest nodded.

"I thought so.  Would you like to eat in this form or as human?"

Kenzan still didn't want to trust these people.  These were the sons of Brron, who had destroyed the world that had once been to create a new one.  It didn't matter that he'd never known that world.  His tail lashed about before he slowly shifted back to his human form.  "What do you want?"

"I could go for some lunch,"  the other twin offered, raising one hand to rest on the head of a pink-purple cat-like creature that appeared on his shoulder.  "What about you?"

Brron laughed uproariously.  "Then let's eat.  Come along, boys."  He shuffled his way along, and Kenzan followed, every step nervous as they headed deeper into the castle. No one here seemed to really care that he was a shapeshifter, only that he was very hungry and so were they. 

He did have to wonder about Geise and what would happen to him, but the prospect of food meant so much more, especially as he could scent well-roasted meat.  There were other scents in there as well, and he wasn't sure if he recognized which type of meat it was, only that it smelled delicious and the more he smelled it, the more he wanted it.

One of the twins nudged him.  "What's your name?  I'm Rune."  He nodded towards his twin.  "That's Johan."  He jerked his head to the third.  "And that's Juudai.  You probably know Brron-sama, don't you?"

Kenzan nodded a little.  He didn't have quite the same sharp senses in human form as he did in his raptor form, but he understood enough with what he had. 

"What's your name?"  Rune asked again.  Kenzan hesitated; he had few options at the moment.  If he wanted to eat, he'd have to do what they wanted.

"Kenzan,"  he said at last.  He didn't remember a lot about his parents, but he recalled his name, at least.  Rune nodded. 

"Nice to meet you, Kenzan.  We're going to be great friends."  And the way he smiled made Kenzan wonder what was going on, and what he'd have to do to find out. He also wasn’t sure about the way that Rune eyed the bruises that still blossomed over his skin.

It wasn't long before he found out at least some of it.  The four guided him to a dining area, with several seats placed around the table.  this was where the delicious scents came from.  Brron seated himself at the head of the table, with Juudai and Johan at his right and left hands, and Rune next to Johan.  Rune nodded towards the empty seat next to him, but before Kenzan could sit down, Brron spoke.

"Before you eat, you're going to pledge yourself to myself and my sons - to protect them when needed, to obey them no matter what."  He laughed softly.  "If you don't, there are other places waiting for you.  Ones you might not as like so much as being their servant."

Kenzan wasn't surprised.  He'd heard enough stories about what Brron did, and it wasn't a surprise that his sons were the same way.  None of them looked even mildly bothered by this.  But he did catch a hint of something in Rune's eyes, something he couldn't place right now.  It wasn't fear; he knew what fear smelled like, no matter his form.

There was a part of him that would forever desire to protect.  He'd done it before, before he learned what he could do, before he'd had to flee the village of his ancestors.  Then he'd done it when he'd guarded that small area he'd called his own, before the hunter took him.  If this was what was desired here - if it got him the food he needed more than he could even think clearly about right now -

"I'll do it,"  Kenzan declared.  He wanted to find out what they had in mind for Geise as well, and he’d not find that out if he fled or remained locked up somewhere.

The other four all nodded and Johan rested one hand on his twin's shoulder.

"Told you that we'd find you a good guardian,"  he said, a hint of pride in his tone.  Kenzan didn't pay too much attention as he settled down and started eating.  Whatever else he needed to do, he'd figure out along the way. 

The End

Notes: I have further ideas for this, including what Geise’s ultimate fate will be. But all in good time!

[eryiss]

Summary: Freed and Gajeel were total opposites in every way, only connected by the guild. When they were forced to train together under Makarov's orders, they expected antagonism and mistrust. Instead, they were given a lesson in how quickly opposition can turn to attraction. The issue: let the budding relationship simmer away, or let it explode. [Freed x Gajeel Multi-chapter]

Notes: Hi all. Thanks for your continued support. This time, now they've decided to give each other a chance, we can see them seeing the benefits of each other's company.

Links: FFN, Ao3, Chapter List

Chapter Five - Cracking The Code

Day Four: Thursday

"Damn," Gajeel murmured. "Maybe I wasn't as harsh on you as I thought."

He didn't know exactly what time it was, nor did he know exactly where he was, but he didn't care. The train journey had been long and, despite Freed's runes taking a lot of the strain off him, Gajeel's stomach had started to squirm and bite against him. The growing nausea mixed with the sparsely healed injuries from the day before and the overall exercion of the past three days had caught up with him, and all he could think of was the bed that Freed had promised him.

By the looks of the building - a large ranch, large enough for Freed's entire team despite the fact he lived alone - the bed would be luxurious. Gajeel had been presumptuous about Freed's wealth in the last few days, and was starting to feel guilty about it, but maybe he hadn't missed the mark.

Sure as hell made his one room apartment look like crap.

"If it makes you feel more comfortable, I have a barn at the edge of my property that has some hay you could sleep in," Freed mumbled under his breath, but Gajeel heard. "I wouldn't want to force you to live outside of your elements, would I?"

"Nah," Gajeel grinned, because he felt guilty about the last three days and didn't wish to get into another argument. "I can try a bed out if I have t'."

Freed explained what was happening during the train ride home, that his demon was influencing their moods and making them more antagonistic. The conversation came from out of nowhere; Freed had a habit of scuffing his feet, Gajeel had gotten annoyed, snapped, and an argument had begun. After some insults, Freed clenched his right fist, rubbed his suddenly glowing eye, and explained the effect that his demon was having on them. After that, they made a decision to think about the reason behind their anger before they spoke, to understand if it was truly what they thought.

It was a tense and fragile truce, and they were acting at being friends. It was a difficult situation to understand; Gajeel didn't really know what he thought of Freed. He knew he was impressed by his resilience, and at some point the slight resentment at the previous day's attack would make way for intrigue and him feeling reluctantly impressed.

Was he really holding back a demon at all times?

"I'll call for Wendy to come here for when you wake up," Freed kept speaking, walking up the staircase with the expectation that Gajeel would follow him. Gajeel did. "She'll be able to be sure I didn't hurt you too badly."

"Sure," Gajeel said, a yawn sneaking out. He didn't miss the small grin on Freed's face when he heard. Dammit, he had been told his yawns were somewhat… feline like. To distract the man, he kept talking. "We doin' any training today? Or just a rest day?"

"I intend to train with you, if you've not got an injury we don't know about," Freed said. "But we should focus on resting first. It's not overly time dependent."

Two days ago, Gajeel might have made a comment about Freed's training regime being too cushy and pampered, but now the words would have come out as bitter and kind of pathetic. Also, his aching body and swirling stomach wanted nothing more than to collapse into a bed and sleep for an age. Damn the tournament and damn the weird forfeit that Makarov had planned.

He followed Freed through the small landing of the upper floor until they stopped by a door, which Freed opened. It was clearly a guest bedroom, nice enough and stocked with more comforts than Gajeel would have been able to fit in his apartment, but definitely not lived in.

"You got a lot of rooms going spare?" Gajeel asked, planting a bag of clothes he'd picked up on the floor.

"Six," Freed said, allowing Gajeel to wander around the room that would be his home for the next three days. "Originally it was intended for the Raijinshuu to all live here, but they need their space, which is understandable. And they stay here from time to time, so normally it doesn't feel so… unoccupied."

Gajeel might have said lonely rather than unoccupied, but it wasn't his place to say.

"You've a bathroom attached to your room and it's stocked with everything you need," Freed explained, then frowned a little. "Well, maybe the two-in-one shampoo and conditioner might not do for you like it does for Laxus, so perhaps you could borrow mine," Freed reached up and curled a lock of Gajeel's hair. "Yes, you keep your hair well. You'll need my products."

"Right," Gajeel said a little curtly, looking at Freed's hand that held his hair with slightly dilated pupils.

"Sorry," Freed said, removing his hand and taking a step back. "I'll be having a shower before sleeping, so if you want me you may need to raise your voice. I'll leave you some time to get used to the room."

"Thanks," Gajeel huffed slightly, not sure what to say.

They looked at each other for a moment, giving each other a nod in goodbye. Freed turned and walked to what was clearly his bedroom, and Gajeel closed the door behind him. He glanced at where Freed might be, absently wondering if this false politeness between them would make way for something more passionate. It felt like he was missing something now he and Freed weren't arguing; maybe Freed was one of the people Gajeel was meant to feel passionately about.

Nah, it was the demon's influence. Must have been. And there was no point in focusing on how they were acting around each other, it wasn't like it would change anything.

He shucked off his jacket, then his shirt and pants. His skin was hardly the cleanest and the blood from his earlier injury wasn't exactly clean, but Freed probably had a change of sheets for him. He climbed into the bed, the mattress a hell of a lot softer than the stained, spring filled piece of crap that made up his own bed. He groaned a little at the soft, cool covers as he wrapped them around his body, burying his face into them. God, whatever they were made of, Gajeel was becoming addicted to instantly.

Maybe he could guilt Freed into giving him these sheets once they were done.

Tiredness overtook him, and he was nearly asleep within a moment. The only thing stopping him from dropping off immediately was the sound of movement in the building. One of few perks of Gajeel's apartment was that the walls were soundproof - he didn't dwell on why that needed to happen - so other people making noise when he was trying to sleep was abnormal.

Not entirely unpleasant. The shifting of fabric followed by water hitting tile was soft, and slightly muffled by the walls between them. But it was comforting, and the sound rhythmic humming that Freed indulged in as he stepped under the water sent a slight shiver down his spine. It had been a while since he'd worked with other people, and the eclectic mess of sounds that accompanied their movements had been missing in Gajeel's life for a while.

He didn't think too much about it, and instead buried his face in the pillow further, a little smile on his face.

——

Gajeel had known Freed was a powerful mage.

The first time they had met one another, if you wanted to call what happened at the festival a meeting, Freed had filled Magnolia with unbreakable rune traps. Though he had been kept in the Cathedral, Gajeel had both seen and heard stories about how many runes had been placed and how complex the traps had been. So clearly he was a powerful man with a lot of magical potential, but he was apparently a genius with his power as well.

For his half of the training, Freed was going to use a 'Simulation Program'. He had explained he had created a selection of runes that would create a training environment made for their specific needs. Apparently it was a complex system that Freed had used many times to push himself.

"So, when we both place our hands on the column, my runes will create a simulation designed to improve our teamwork," Freed explained, motioning to a shaft of runes in the middle of his basement.

"And you ain't gonna be controlling it?" Gajeel asked, looking at the runes with a slight tilt in the head.

"No, the program essentially has a mind of its own," Freed explained, placing his hand on the column without hesitation. The runes seemed to glow under his touch. "I can cancel it, of course, should it get too intense or if the simulation just isn't working out. But so far it's always been an achievable task and always helped me with training."

"You got any idea what it'll be like?" Gajeel asked, stepping towards the runes.

"Not at all," Freed had a near giddy look on his face; like Natsu before a fight. Maybe he was more Fairy Tail like than Gajeel thought. "When you're ready."

Gajeel shrugged, placed his hand on the column, and allowed it to take some of his magic.

Eight walls of runes suddenly lurched upwards, glowing and dripping with magic. The basement seemed to fall away, replaced by pristine whiteness that seemed to be like a void. Gajeel knew he hadn't been teleported - the teleportation had felt different - so clearly they were still in the basement, but the reality of the room had changed. Gajeel looked to the side; Freed could literally create runes that could change the world around him. All whiteout breaking a sweat.

What would he be able to do without the runes keeping his demon contained?

The thought was gone as quickly as it came. On one of the eight walls, letters began to form as if written from fire. They weren't runes - Freed's runes were square and angular, these letters were more flowing and rounded - and Gajeel didn't have a damn clue what it said. He glanced towards Freed again, to see an expression of open confusion.

He scrunched up his nose when he was confused. Hah.

Before either man could say anything, a wall of magic appeared before them in a language that both Gajeel and Freed could read.

'To finish the simulation, you must complete two tasks. One mental, one physical. These tasks will bring you closer together and highlight your potential as a team.

Task One: Translate the Words and Speak Them Aloud.'

"Yer good with languages right?" Gajeel murmured. "Should be easy."

"This language is incredibly old," Freed frowned, walking to the wall where the statement was written. "Frankly, I've never seen it before. I wouldn't know where to start."

"Yer magic knows things you don't?" Gajeel frowned.

"Apparently."

This wasn't the type of thing that Gajeel could help with, so he leant on one of the walls and decided to watch as Freed worked. The other man was scribbling things down on a wall of runes that he's created which seemed to only allow for writing. He still had his nose all scrunched up while he was thinking, and he kept tucking his hair behind his ear when it fell. It was funny to think this was the same man who had gone primal and all jungle-man the day before.

He really had misjudged Freed, hadn't he? Now he knew the demon had been affecting his mood - and knew how to ignore that influence - it was easy to agree that Freed was powerful. Hell, maybe if they hadn't gotten off to such a bad start, they would have been good teammates.

They could still, that's what the point of the simulation was, right? To bring them together.

Gajeel didn't know how giving Freed a task that Gajeel would be no help with might bring them together, but the simulation seemed pretty impressive so far. He let his gaze fall on the untranslated words again, and actually looked at them this time. It still looked like a selection of random lines, and Gajeel nearly gave up and went back to watching Freed again. It was only when he saw a familiar spiral looking shape in with the rest of the lines that he realised how this was meant to bring them closer.

"Fuck," Gajeel cussed, and Freed immediately looked towards him. "It's Draconic."

"Draconic?" Frred said incredulously. "That language has been dead for millennia. You know it."

"No," Gajeel shook his head. "Well, not really. Even when I was a kid there was no point in learning it since it was forgotten by everyone but the dragons. Metalicana, he was basically my father, insisted that I be able to write my own name in my language," He walked to the writing and pointed at the single spiral. "That's an 'A', I could never get that right. Pa used to yell at me, so I remember it."

"You don't happen to remember the rest, do you?"

"Not of the top of my head," Gajeel spoke under his breath. "Can I use that writing rune thing?"

"Of course," Freed said, making a motion. The small slab of runes that Freed had been scribbling on flew towards him, and Gajeel sat cross-legged on the floor like he had when he was a kid. Suddenly, he felt like he was back in the fields where he had grown up, writing with chalk on stone under his Pa's instructions. He didn't often think about his youth; it was nice.

His arm moved without him thinking. Writing his name was muscle memory, and the familiar pattern of lines that was his name in Draconic quickly was printed on the runes. It had been years since he had seen it. It was nice.

He couldn't dwell on it. He certainly couldn't get emotional about it.

"I'm pretty sure it's similar to how we write. There's a letter for A, a letter for B and so on," Gajeel murmured a little. "Give me a second."

He wrote his name normally under the Draconic counterpart, showing what each letter's counterpart was. Freed made quick work of finding all the letters of Gajeel's name in the statement written on the wall. On the wall there was one G, one A, three E's, one L, four R's, one D, two F's and three O's. Not enough to find out what the statement was, but it was a starting point. Freed had immediately began trying to look for patterns in the letters they already knew, hoping to reverse engineer the alphabet. By the look of frustration on his face, it didn't seem to be working.

"You need help?" Gajeel asked, taking a step towards Freed. "Anything I can do?"

"Did your father only teach you how to write your name?" Freed asked, and Gajeel found it oddly comforting that Freed didn't seem off put by the fact Gajeel called a literal dragon his father. "Is that the only link to your Draconic ancestry you have? Do you know any history? It might help."

Well Gajeel could do that.

Years worth of history lessons seemed to spew out without Gajeel thinking. Everything from how dragons used to live, to the nesting patterns of hatchlings, to everything else that Gajeel had thought had left his head years ago. Once he started talking it felt like he couldn't stop, and Freed didn't seem to want him to. It was kinda nice to be able to talk about his past openly; the only other people who might have understood were Natsu and Wendy. They already knew everything, Freed didn't.

Once Gajeel had run out of things to say, Freed asked him more about the nesting patterns. Gajeel went through it all again, and inadvertently explained the types of mountains Dragons used to nest in. From this, Freed figured out which continent the Dragons lived on, and what cultures developed from Draconic influence. Somehow, he managed to reverse engineer the Draconic alphabet from that of a language currently in use.

Gods, how did the man's mind work?

"There's good news and bad news," Fred eventually said, looking back at Gajeel. "We've translated it, but it seems my magic has an agenda of sorts."

Before Gajeel could ask what that meant, Freed motioned for his writing runes to fly towards him. It was incredibly weird, and funny, seeing just how bad Freed's handwriting was, but he quickly ignored that. As much as he wanted to make fun of the man for his near incomprehensible writing, they weren't close enough to say things like that to one another.

Hm. Gajeel had kind of forgotten he was nervous about his relationship with Freed for a moment.

Rather than fixating, he looked down to the runes again and saw what Freed had translated. He grinned a little when he saw what they had to say to progress; Freed's magic did have an agenda, and didn't seem to be very subtle.

"We gotta say it at the same time?" Gajeel asked.

"I expect so," Freed agreed. A moment later, they both spoke.

"Our similarities outweigh our differences."

With a flurry of movements, the runes glowed and the room shifted around them. The words on the walls disappeared, and a small metal rod rose up from the ground. A metre away from the metal rod, a spark of lighting appeared in the air, flicking with powerful magic. A moment later, the instruction appeared in front of them both.

'Task Two. Conduct the electricity from the lighting into the metal rod. Touching the lighting will fill you with enough pain to render you unconscious, meaning you have failed the simulation.'

"Shit," Gajeel whispered. "Yer runes can be brutal."

"They're usually not quite so bad," Freed mused, walking towards the lightning and inspecting it, though not closely enough to touch it. "I intended the simulation to make us work well as a team. I suppose after the way we have been treating one another for the past few days, my magic believed we need something intense to bring us tougher."

"Guess so," Gajeel mumbled, a little guiltily. He was responsible for that. "Sorry."

"Don't be," Freed dismissed, seemingly fascinated by the challenge. "Honestly, I think the challenges are aimed at challenging my preconceived ideas about you. I had written you off as an idiot who could only utilize your fists, so my magic put us in a situation where you would talk about something you're well versed in and passionate about," Freed was still looking at the spark, a little wistful in his expression. "Frankly, the way you described your culture was beautiful. It certainly destroyed any ideas I had about your mind being anything but… well, wonderful."

Gajeel flushed a little at the compliment, looking away. He wasn't great when people said good things about him, and he tended to deflect when it happened.

"So, yer magic worked. We respect each other at least now, right?" Gajeel said gruffly, Freed nodded. "Other than respect, the only thing I need to work well with another guy is trust. So, guess this is made to make us trust each other."

Freed hummed a little, and his nose scrunched up again.

Fuck, it was kinda cute.

"Say, hypothetically, that this lightning didn't cause you any pain," Freed mused aloud, glancing between the spark of lighting and the metal rod. "Would you be able to use your magic to transform your body into a conductive metal. So you could stretch your fingers from the spark to the rod and have the current pass through you?"

"Yeah, I think so," Gajeel shrugged a little. "Don't exactly wanna touch it if it'll knock me out. Had enough of that this week," He had spoken before thinking, and Freed averted his gaze. "Shit I didn't mean to say that."

"No, no. It's fair," Freed said passively, but didn't seem to believe his words.

"Why'd you ask anyway?" Gajeel asked, trying to avert the topic.

"I've crafted runes that will lessen the effect of lighting magic, a necessity of working with Laxus," Freed explained, looking at the spark again. "If you're correct and this is to make us trust one another, then perhaps it's as simple as you using your magic to make a metal bridge between source and the rod, and you have to trust that my runes will stop you from hurting."

"Guess it makes sense," Gajeel agreed, frowning. "You sure it works?"

"It has worked against every type of lightning I've used it to deflect from before," Freed said, looking to Gajeel. "I can't promise that it will work, though. This is made of my magic, not natural lightning, so there's no way of knowing for sure yet."

Gajeel thought for a moment, before stealing himself and shrugging. "Fuck it, we ain't got any other ideas. Lay it on me."

Freed moved to stand behind Gajeel, and a moment later a cold hand was pressed against the back of his neck. He heard muttering in a language he didn't know, then the familiar feeling of magic rolling down his skin. The sensation of a rune on his skin was unknown to him - a rune not meant to hurt him anyway - and it sent a slight shiver down his spine. Maybe that was just because Freed was cupping his neck; it was a part of his body that people didn't often touch, after all.

A sheen of magic flowed over his skin, and Gajeel watched as his body flowed purple for a second. The spell was obviously completed, as the magic seemed to seep into his skin, but Freed still kept his hand on Gajeel's neck.

"You gonna let go?" He asked with a frown.

"No. If my rune fails, we should share the pain," Freed's tone left no room for argument.

"It's yer funeral," Gajeel mumbled.

He placed his hand on the iron rod, covering his skin with his iron. Slowly, he extended one of his hands towards the flickering sparks of lighting, wincing a little as it got closer. He really fucking hoped Freed's runes worked, because even after Wendy had come by to heal him, Gajeel wasn't fully recovered. Another bout of unconsciousness would only make things worse.

With a flinch, he forced his metallic digit into the lightning. It didn't hurt as such, more like a tingle that spread through him and perhaps Freed. The lightning passed across him, into his hand, and lit the metal rod up. The room turned green.

"Guess it worked," Gajeel grinned a little, turning to Freed.

When he turned, he was taken aback by the sight of the other man. Freed was hot, Gajeel hadn't bothered to hide that even when they were arguing, and he was handsome too. But when he was smiling a victorious smile, a slight magical haze in his eyes, expression equal parts cocky and satisfied, he looked fucking beautiful. The glow of the purple runes illuminated his pale skin, made his eyes shine, and made Gajeel damn near breathless.

He was staring at him, and suddenly something fell into place. He had wondered what would take the place of the antagonism between them, and suddenly an option was shown to him. Freed was now sexy, handsome and beautiful. He had a scrunchy nose, hummed in the shower, and had a wild side.

"It did," Freed's voice, which sounded like honey now Gajeel paid attention, cut through his thoughts. "Thank you for trusting me, Gajeel."

"Ain't a problem, Pretty-Boy."

The slip of the tongue made Gajeel freeze. Freed didn't comment on it, but Gajeel didn't miss the slight upturn of his lips. Fuck he had a pretty smile, didn't he?

Gods dammit.

[wlw-lovestruck-fiction]

Well. In light of the recent vanessa fic, I am going to request a few things. How about Helena going to MC's high school reunion?

WARNINGS: Intolerable sexist arseholes Referenced rape culture Blood and minor violence Written by: @evoedbd ******************************************

“Helena… my feet hurt.” Kya’s soft, plaintive voice rung like gunshots in Helena’s ears. To hear that Kya was in pain caused a war of sensations within the Sorceress, turning her chest into a battlefield as she aimed to pick out her own thoughts amidst the din. The music was too loud. All pulsing beats and pop hits that all bled into one another in an unpleasant screech. With all the beauty Kya’s people could capture, the fact they abused that power to capture such meaningless garble was bad enough, but the songs that Helena’s ears had picked out went beyond this. The images of men taking what they pleased, or endlessly fucking hoes and capping foes… it set her teeth on edge. Why would anybody wish to put a cap on someone they disliked so much? It was absolutely beyond her. After all, she had seen the selfishness of humanity. She had seen people who would do precisely what the songs fantasized about. She had been one of those prizes. The pet. The mess left behind once a tyrant had finished with her for the night. She had been the violated girl dragging herself across the floors because she couldn’t walk, trailing blood. Why did some of Kya’s people find this concept worth celebrating? How many even knew what they danced to? “Helena?” This time, Kya’s voice was pleading. A gentle touch to Helena’s ravaged senses. This was accompanied by the lightest touch to her forearm, fingertips begging for more yet restraining themselves until Helena gave consent. The Sorceress had to close her eyes, to stop watching and picture a much calmer place. An open field, filled with flowers that had no name, not in this world. Flowers woven through black hair, accompanying laughter that became wings for Helena’s soul. She didn’t particularly want to open her eyes to the gyrating crowds. Around her, she could feel a thousand candles, each flickering in time with the sea of sorry, middle-aged bodies awkwardly trying to reclaim their youth. All dressed in finery above their means as they tried to convince everyone of their success and happiness, even as they reeked of misery. An ocean of people, all smiling politely whilst firing knives from their tongue, shooting daggers from their eyes. Alcohol flowing a little too freely, too dangerously. Control, so willingly abandoned. It was as if none of them knew its value. As if none of these people had ever seen or experienced control torn away completely, until even the breath a body took was at another’s whim. Then there were the lights. A spinning ball reflected everything, casting a thousand fragments of light across the floor, growing larger as they grew further from the centre. Spinning chaos across the wooden floors, illuminating the deep blue lighting, catching in the mist across the dancing masses. An unnatural mist summoned by machines… and Kya said her people possessed no magic. “Helena… are you with me?” The longing to answer hit her harder than a boulder from a catapult against a crumbling castle wall. Gods, how she wanted to open her eyes and find only one person before her. Yet, she was surrounded; drowning in the sea of bodies as the unnatural mist lapped at her ankles. As elbows collided with her, or fingers nipped at the bottom of her hair like vultures testing the fight left in their meat. Her heart pounded, beating against the cage of her chest much like how her magic pulsed with her fears. Limbs tingled; fingers began to move on instinct. Then, warmth. So much warmth. Enough that she gasped. Instantly, her lungs filled with air; her nose with that delicious mix she had never quite learned. Something soft, something smoky and then a hint of spice. Always, it was sweet. So very, very intoxicatingly sweet… but not sugary. The underlying bitterness of coffee tempered sweetness so deliciously that Helena found herself devoured by her craving for that scent. A second inhale gave her more, slowly begun to redirect her roaming senses to a singular focus. It was enough for her to open her eyes. “Welcome back.” A kind voice fell from naked lips. The smile upon them was small, nothing intended for the world to see. A secret amidst the crowd, the last life jacket on the Titanic. Just seeing it was enough for Helena to be saved. Shining grey eyes accompanied that encouraging little smile. Adoration glistened in beautiful grey depths, outshining the tinges of concern playing flecks in bluestone. In the swirling lights and dulled room, stone was more akin to gems than cobble, captivating Helena’s attention for far longer than society deemed polite. She could care less. Museums held marble statues of deities past, depictions of Aphrodite to stare at for hours. Marble was incomparable to the greys, Aphrodite a hag compared to the graceful woman donning such a flowing black dress. Elegance in its purest simplicity. “As if I could ever be parted from you.” Helena gave her best attempt at a purr. It was effective, given the creep of pink over Kya’s pale cheeks. Pale, not bloodless, Helena reminded herself. Bloodless was danger. It was the colour Kya had gone after the Queen’s spell struck her. It was the colour Kya had been when the Queen held a blade to her throat, when the Queen tormented Helena into confessing every pain, tried to make Sorceress scream and kneel. Tried to break her. Bloodless was the Witch Queen leering over a terrified girl, or ordering her most loyal man to ensure said girl was prepared… Helena flinched. Faster than Helena could blink, Kya’s hands left her, gathering in front of said woman’s chest. Kya held her hands there patiently, as if they were to be bound. Somehow, the speed and implications of such a gesture did not spark further fear within Helena, did not reignite the painful memories lapping at the edge of her consciousness. How such gestures could be made soft and welcoming, appealing even, still befuddled her. Flummoxed, her breath caught, even as Kya spoke. “Helena, I’m going to grab your tie, ok? I won’t pull, and my hands won’t move until I know you are ok. If you need to grab me, that’s ok. I know you won’t hurt me. We can just sway.” “The music is too upbeat for such a slow dance.” Came Helena’s rebuttal, even as her body moved to follow Kya’s suggestion. Cautiously, she gathered Kya into her chest, holding the otherworldly beauty there as if the world might snatch her away. Beneath Helena’s pale skin magic simmered. It heated her veins, writhing and bubbling like serpents of heated tar. She could feel the sparks escaping her control, trapped between her skin and her silken black button up. Kya had expressed her appreciation for Helena’s suit, several times, yet Helena had not seen the appeal until just now. The darkness of her shirt slimmed her down a little, whilst also concealing the fact she was sweating bullets. Her turquoise suit jacket was cut to perfection, emphasising both the strength of her shoulders and her feminine curves, without drawing attention to an overly generous bust. The matching pants fit her like a second skin, showing off impossibly long legs right to heels which meant business. Not only did they elevate her above the heads of many men, they also screamed womanly power. That she could, and would, step on any fool who crossed her path. Then, there was her crisp white tie… the very tie currently embraced between Kya’s gentle fingers. “Who cares about the music? We make our own rules, babe, always have. This was meant to be something fun, Helena. I didn’t think it’d be like this. I just thought it’d be romantic. Like going to prom with my soulmate, instead of some boy who expected me to finish the night on the backseat of his car.” “That boy dare-“ “He didn’t try to physically force me. He was confused as to why I wouldn’t, tried to convince me verbally, but he never laid a hand on me. He wasn’t a bad person, just an ignorant one. He was influenced by the wrong people. He actually wrote me an apology. It doesn’t makes my memory of prom the best.” “Yeah, had a bitch, but she ain’t bad as you. So hit me up when you passing through. I’ll give you something big enough to tear your ass in two” “ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!” Kya exploded, her wrath erupting in an enraged shout. Her voice carried, drawing countless gazes to the human embodiment of furious flames about to claim their penance. Kya’s entire body trembled, almost as if her growls were causing her to vibrate, and her cheeks took on a hue often associated with a devil. The fire in her eyes seemed poised to devour the world in its search for vengeance, yet Kya tempered it to three precise culprits. Three large men, all crowding around an uncomfortable-looking DJ who cringed as the song continued to play across a stagnant dance floor. “What’s wrong? Don’t like the music, dyke?” The first man sneered, his voice grating from between crooked teeth. His mates laughed, playfully jabbing him in his well-padded arms, hooting their drunken approval. His large belly jiggled as he laughed. Helena’s eye was drawn to his shirt, specifically the valiant efforts of a single thread stretched between a disconnected button and said shirt. “You’ve been playing rape culture bullshit for over half an hour. Do you even know what half of this shit means? Slip her a Molly? That is roofies! Drugging a woman’s drink to sleep with her, cause that’s totally sexy. That Nirvana song? It is literally about a rape victim. Did you idiots even stop to think that some people here might have gone through that?” Kya’s accusations were sharp, to the point, a jab of a blade straight to the ribcage. “We thought it was setting the mood. Isn’t your bitch DTF? She looks the type.” The second man taunted, giving a poor attempt at a suggestive wiggle of his brows. This man appeared more in shape, lithe, with the veins standing stark beneath his muscles. However, the stench of alcohol was only smothered by the copious amounts of noisme body spray he stained his wrinkled shirt with. “This isn’t the 1800s, dude. Women have the right to get married and be together outside of a Pornhub video.” Kya’s tone dropped along with her brows, her expression challenging, daring the men to come up with a retort worthy of her. “It isn’t rape if the bitch wants it.” The third man jeered. Unlike his counterparts, he appeared clean and put together, something Helena might have even called attractive before he opened his mouth. A good-looking man, ruined by his horrific mouth or corrupt by the company he kept. “What happened to you three? How can you be so cruel as to deliberately target someone just for existing? I know you’ve been watching us and noticed Helena’s reactions.” Kya’s words struck Helena to the core. Suddenly everything made too much sense. How the songs had seemed to only get worse and worse, their violations and sexist attitude more crudely represented. More stark. How the music had steadily grown louder and louder, until their sounds had burned into Helena’s consciousness. Until they became shadows which she could not be free of. Shadows where leering eyes hid, a pride of lions or a pack of wolves slowly circling their prey. What she had dismissed as a trickle of sweat down her back now stood out, an instinctual twinge, a warning. One she had not taken heed of. It left her wondering, was anywhere truly safe for her aside from Kya’s arms? Even in this strange new world, where nobody knew her crimes, she found herself persecuted. Had coming here truly been the new start she believed it to be? Or had she just fled her own insecurity into a pit of newer, wiser vipers whilst she played catch up for over thirty years of missing knowledge? “This is America, we have the right to listen to what we want.” “You have a constitutional right not to be a colossal dick.” Kya fired back without pause. This earned several snickers from around the room at the man’s expense. She wasn’t done, not even close. Kya continued, launching into a scolding with enough disgust in her tone to cow the watching crowds. “After everything she has done for this damn country, hell, the world, she deserves ONE night without some douchebags throwing shit at her. All we wanted was to come and have a lovely night out, not cop sexual harassment from a failed security guard, an alcoholic and a walking advertisement for how not to be a man all trying to relive their high school glory days.” “What? She got bored of servicing all the real men and went for her own bitch to boss around instead?” The second man taunted, snickering loudly at Kya’s repulsed expression. The expression was barely a flicker on the way to a smile. No, a smile implied genuine joy and happiness. Kya’s expression was something far darker. Ink dropped into water, sinking to the bottom of the glass. Purity tainted by malicious intent. Helena internally flinched. That expression was unlike anything she had seen from Kya before, save when Kya dealt with the Queen. It was the closest Kya could ever come to such wickedness; the closest Helena could bare to see her fall. “Oh I get it now. This is about your inferiority complex that no woman as gorgeous as Helena would want to be within ten feet of you unless it was to deliver a restraining order.” Kya’s voice was so calm, so crisp and clear, yet somehow a sneer. Something that even the Witch Queen could never truly pull off. It all happened so fast. Faster than Helena could even react. One moment, Kya was snarling in the face of some asshole, the next he had reached out in a sloppy attempt to smack her. Kya was faster. In a blink, she had grabbed the man’s wrist, grip unyielding, stepped into his space and twisted her body. Just like Helena had taught her. The man went plummeting to the ground in a flurry of ill-fitting formalwear and disgusting body spray. The collision was bone-jarring, filling the room with an audible thud. Before anybody could do anything more than gasp, the third man launched at Kya’s exposed back. Helena’s heart leapt into her throat, her magic burning beneath her skin in preparation to unleash. It was a pointless endeavour. Kya moved naturally, as fluidly as a trickling stream with the passion of a dancer and the heart of a knight. Her elbow came up, driven into the man’s nose without a moment of hesitation. He too fell, left with only his hands to try and still the raging current of blood pouring between his trembling fingers. His hands desperately palmed the broken mass of his nose, which made his cries sound wet and gargling. A second strike, a vicious kick to his groin, ensured he would not be getting up again. Helena arched a brow. That was not something she had taught Kya. “How?” The most rotund of the three questioned, wisely keeping his hands well away from Kya as she stormed up to him. Helena knew his fear, it was once an intimate companion to her afterall. He looked at Kya as if she were the Witch Queen, something which sat uneasily in Helena’s gut. Even here, Kya was not the Queen. She had not taken evident joy in her power over these men, nor in their fear. Kya wore an entirely too calm expression, as if the violence had been a bore to her. As if the blood running down her arm was something to be nonchalant about. She was silent as she reached out, hooking a single finger into the string stretched between button and shirt. Finally, it gave out, snapping under the added pressure. Then, Kya spoke, her voice kept low as if to protect the man from further humiliation. “My wife is a war hero. I’m not the scary one.” She informed, using the tails of his shirt to wipe the blood from her arm. At Kya’s words, Helena noticed the room focus on her for a moment, awe and respect flooding their eyes in a manner that was entirely too familiar. Too uncomfortable. It was the awe and fear of Reiner’s army. How long would it be until they too saw the monster she could be? Could that be how they now viewed Kya? “She’s earned her peace, and I’ll fuck up anybody who tries to attack that. She shouldn’t have to kill anybody else to protect this country, let alone deal with shitfucks like your friends shaming her for having an ounce of happiness.” Kya continued, eyes blazing dangerously. That. That there was something the Queen never had. The heat in her eyes, the fire and compassion. Helena’s heart rose in her throat. She’d seen this scene before. The Queen, leering over her prey, leaning down to mock their failure before she crushed them. Now Helena could see it. Kya’s connection to the Queen. The heat had faded from her cheeks, yet that heat seemed to have migrated to her eyes. Where the queen froze, Kya blazed, charring the man’s willpower to cinders with but one annoyed glance. Her focused glare had him trembling, fearing what she might do next. Helena felt that fear. Had the queen claimed her lover? Was she to truly lose her happiness now? Was fate so cruel? “Your friends will need medical care. That elbow could have broken more than his nose, and your other buddy smacked his head pretty hard.” Kya added, concern filtering into her expression for a microsecond before she turned. With the grace and confidence of a Queen, she strode over to the first man, her dress fluttering around her knees like wisps of shadows and silk. She leaned down towards the man, crouching so that she could speak directly to him. “If I ever hear you dared touch another soul without their consent, then you will no longer have hands.” Kya warned, her voice a tide of outrage tempered by her own compassion. Her hand upon him reminded him to stay down, but also touched with concern. Feeling how his heart rose to meet her palm. Despite his unfocused gaze, he afforded her his full attention, staring at her as if he was looking upon an Angel. No, not an Angel. A Valkyrie of Nordic legend. A guide to the lost heroes, the one to guide their souls to peace. Helena understood, for she gazed in utter devotion. This Kya was a new creature, one embodying her soulmate, channelling Helena’s protective energy in a uniquely Kya way. Helena couldn’t help but smile, to grace her protector with an approving twitch of her lips and a nod. Kya was not the Queen, nor did she continue her violence when it was not in defence. She had picked up arms in this moment so Helena would not. So Helena did not have to. Just as Kya had promised, she protected Helena’s peace. Kya rose after a few more moments, stony eyes softened to gems as she gazed upon Helena. The Valkyrie extended her hand, fingers imploring Helena’s to weave between them with a silent little wiggle. Helena, a lost soul if ever there was one, was helpless to do anything but reach, to accept the hand offered to her. With the softest of smiles, she entrusted herself entirely to her soulmate, her Valkyrie, trusting that if Kya was not her peace then at least she would lead Helena there.

[popsiclemania]

My 2020 in K dramas (+1 J drama)

I began watching k-dramas in 2018 but I’ve never watched as many shows, Korean or otherwise, as I have in this one. 2020 ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. I think what helps me really enjoy this over Bollywood+Malayalam+ American pop culture I grew up with is that a smirk on the wrong character’s face doesn’t make me seethe with rage and want to burn everything down. It’s not like growing up with SRK on screen and then having SRK wannabes leave you with lifelong trauma in reality. I can just move on. It’s removed enough from my everyday life but still familiar in a generic Asian family way. Does that make sense? It’s not perfect and it’s not free of its own harmful stereotypes and narratives, but there’s enough of the good stuff to make you stick around. This year I fell in love with Nana, Kim Hye Soo, Han Yeri, Park Eun bin, Ahn Eun jin, Kim Bum, Kim Yong ji, Flower Boy’s Go Dok Mi and Search:WWW’s Bae Tami. Cancelled Ji Chang wook (bye). Desperately missed Kim Jae Wook. Had thoughts on Hwang In Yeop, which were mostly heart eyes. Discovered J dramas and fell in love with Cherry Magic’s Adachi.

My year-in-review below:

LOVED

Into The Ring - I am so glad I saved this for a rainy day because it’s exactly the kind of upright citizen shenanigans my unemployed ass needed at the end of the year.

Goo Se Ra thinks the govt should work for the people but that doesn’t mean her own moral compass always points north. Her purpose is to make steady money, and I love seeing her go hard to survive and cobble together what she needs. The thing that really works for me is that she wants to be good, but she isn’t always. And you get to see her be disappointed, upset, embarrassed and hurt from being publicly kicked in the gut as she navigates a job where she appears, on the surface, to be a supremely confident, self-serving, accidental politician. What you see as her naiveté is mostly just her being a regular person in an environment dictated by backhand deals and rich people politics. She gets hit again and again, and you see what it does to her sense of worth to get back up again, how she grapples with her self. And through all this the show is funny?! Se Ra is what writers of manic pixie characters think they are doing and not doing at all. Love her friends, and Jang Hye-jin is *chef’s kiss*!

Hyena - Kim Hye Soo’s Jung Geum Ja is perhaps Se Ra’s older and darker contemporary.  Geum Ja is a survivor and will get what she wants and where she wants to, however many hells she has to cross. She’s single-minded about her success, ruthless and has no qualms about bending morals to get the outcome she needs. She’ll never compromise on who she is or justify how she lives, can build people up and also tear them down, but she also knows care and kindness.

I turned to Signal for more Kim Hye Soo but was disappointed in how the first few episodes seemed to shortchange her. May try again in 2021.

(Highly recommend @saltr0se​’s  fic series which just GETS Geum Ja so well. Fic writers are the best)

Search: WWW (Finished in 2020) - It took me half a year to finish this. I started watching Search in Oct 2019 and raced through the first 6 episodes because I couldn’t take my eyes off the rollercoaster of Bae Tami’s life. And then I had to take a break because it was a little too close to the frenetic pace of my own industry. As @drivingsideways wrote, a lot of Search is premised around ‘patriarchy? who dat?’, which is why watching its politics play out is so fascinating.  It’s also deliciously turmoil-y to watch a very clear-sighted, weathered Tami put on rose-tinted glasses for her romance and then frequently peer over them to evaluate whether it could actually meld into her life.

Catch The Ghost - Kim Seonho oozes charm and perhaps Startup was a showcase of how effectively he can be a typical male lead. But Catch is exactly not that. Go Jiseok and Yoo Ryeong have moulded their lives around to meet their most desperate wishes in life and in the process also left parts of themselves untended. There is guilt, pain and need. Now guess who will tend to whose wounds? Their dynamic is electric even when the central mystery flags towards the last few episodes of the show. I really hope Moon Geun Young is doing well and gets more amazing roles soon. She is so good here.

(Highly recommend @melonatures​‘s fic for putting that sizzling on-screen chemistry into words. HOW?!) Cherry Magic - Stories about painfully awkward people are my jam and Eiji Akaso gets Adachi’s shy, nervy energy so right. Cherry Magic is straight up just 12 hours of 🥺🥺🥺. 

Stranger/Secret Forest - I’ve been devouring the entirety of Agatha Christie’s work this year after Stranger reminded me how comforting murder mysteries can be. I love Bae Doona. I also love characters who don’t get social norms, not always because they are out to flout them but because that’s just not how their mind/brain works. (have to watch S2)

Flower Boy Next Door -  Honestly, the opening scene introducing Park Shin Hye’s character Go Deok Mi sold me on this immediately. An introverted, penny pinching copy editor living alone and working from home thanks to extreme social anxiety? Love. All the side characters are a lot of fun and I’ve never loved Kim Seulgi and Go Kyung Pyo more. It’s a warm show, slowly rounding off the sharp edges of every character.

JUST FUN

The Spies Who Loved Me -  It’s been a year of disappointing rom-coms and Spies kind of quietly turned it around for me. I want to be the fly on Yoo In Na’s wall as she figures how to play her characters. I’ve only seen her in 3 roles but somehow she always manages to be in character arcs that don’t short change her. Spies could’ve been and sometimes is the regular heterosexual fare, but In Na ups the ante over and over again, coming out on top as the smartest person in the room.

ENJOYED WITH *RESERVATIONS*

I have to watch A Piece Of Your Mind again because I don’t understand how Jung Hae In and Chae Soo bin built SO MUCH warmth and crackling chemistry with barely a kiss. I was iffy about how the whole AI thing started off and the tortured musician plotline (angsty male artists will forever be an eyeroll for me).

Park Min Young is a queen who never disappoints and When The Weather Is Nice is everything you want in a winter romance. My reservation was in how they explore so much of domestic abuse and the complex ways its traumatised the women in this family. I’m ok with the characters having imperfect ways of processing and understanding the violence, I welcome it. I’m not ok with the show dancing around whether the pivotal crime was justified/ self defence (it was).

A lot of dramas did this. I loved Han Yeri and Choo Ja Hyun in My Unfamiliar Family, I didn’t like the free pass the show gave their dad’s abusive character. 

Hwang Jung Eum’s comedy style is generally not my thing but she was pretty great in Mystic Pop-UP Bar. But I’m side-eyeing the sanctity surrounding motherhood. Maybe I should read more about babies and Korean folklore.

Hospital Playlist was my comfort watch through June and July. I think its wholesomeness and non-plot writing came at a good time for me. But I noticed then that the throughline for all main characters was moral superiority and hence what I then saw as *wholesomeness*. It’s kind of what makes it a grating rewatch in parts. Plus the real life of misogyny of Yoo Yeon Seok makes me want to push his angelic catholic character off a cliff. (For context, i was raised catholic). I want to continue loving Chae Song Hwa, and for that the showrunners need to stop cornering her with overbearing romantic interests (let that woman breathe! she literally ran away to another city!) 

Hospital is good at creating moments of comfort, so much so that I went to watch Reply 1988 after it, but had to drop it coz I couldn’t get into it. Maybe I’ll come back to it next year.

Once Again is what I call joint family propaganda. What it does well is lay bare the mechanics of living in a society that prizes the heterosexual family structure, the loops you have to jump through to hide when you break its rules and what happens when you are found out. I love the characters, their fights, their frustrations. I just don’t love the validation of joint families. (context: i grew up in an oppressive joint family lol). In my au, Nahee and Gyujin don’t get married again or immediately have children, but take the long route to figuring out how to love the person the other is. Gahee is openly dating Hyo shin and her parents have to figure out how to process her success and her romance. Young dal and Ok boon have to learn to stop dictating their children’s lives.  Joon sun runs his company from home, so his wife Hyun kyung can work on what she wants. Choyeon, Joori and Ga-yeon go back to being flamboyant AF and the market learns to not judge. Gyujin and Jaesok have to actually work on the relationship with their mother and what sent her into depression. Just a lot of learning involved.

Just Between Lovers was a nice watch, i just don’t get how Kang doo and Ha Moon So’s relationship will survive his constantly simmering anger. 

Crash Landing on You was so much fun until the main romance turned angsty, but it gave us North Korean soldier shenanigans and the epic romance of Seo Dan and Alberto Gu that we needed more of.

Tale of The Nine Tailed is probably what Goblin wished it was. I, however, will never be over Lee Rang. (Also, when can gods stop meeting their love interests as babies? Asking for my sanity)

I literally ignored everything in Oh My Ghost except Park Bo Young and Kim Seulgi and it was amazing. 

NOPE

Goblin, Dinner Mate, Oh My Baby and My Secret Romance were a whole lot of NO, NAHI, ILLAAA. 

I loved hate-watching The King:Eternal Monarch with the rest of k drama tumblr but someone please take away Kim Eun-sook’s access to gigantic budgets and all-star casts.

It was painful to watch Do You Like Brahms squander away its potential but I’m glad to be introduced to Park Eun bin. Age of Youth is next on watchlist.

More than Friends to me is only Ahn Eun jin. Someone give her amazing lead roles asap.

Why did Record of Youth do that to Park So Dam and her clothes? Just why

WANTED TO WATCH, BUT COULDN’T BECAUSE *INTENSE* 

World Of The Married, It’s Okay Not To Be Okay, Sweet Home, Extracurricular, Penthouse, Flower of Evil, Lie After Lie

WILL WATCH NEXT YEAR

SF8, Stove League, Birth Care Centre but I’ll start the new year with School Nurse Files coz it looks very good.

[angelqueen04]

Hamliza Month, Day 6

@megpeggs @historysalt

Toxic Summary: Eliza arrives at her parents’ home in June 1798 to find letters waiting for her.

Merit, virtue, and talents must have enemies and is always exposed to envy so that, my Eliza, you see the penalties attending the position of so amiable a man.  All this you would not have suffered if you had married into a family less near the sun.  But then the pride, the pleasure, the nameless satisfactions, etc.[1]

Eliza sighs, tossing the letter down on the secretary in front of her. It joins the pile of other letters that she had found waiting for her when she had arrived at her family’s home, her daughter and infant son accompanying her. Because of course there would be letters waiting for her. There are always letters. Hamilton is never one to remain silent, even at a distance.

She had been surprised to see a letter from Angelica, however. They had seen each other the day before Eliza had left by sloop. Why the need to write the very same evening after her departure?

In all truth, her sister’s words do nothing more than irritate her. Of course her sister would seek to blame all of Eliza’s misfortunes upon others, and not just that, but blame others for Alexander’s own sins. Eliza has spent nearly two decades refusing to acknowledge whatever whispers might crop up about the relationship between Angelica and Alexander (she certainly never gave one grain of credence to the vile suppositions that Alexander had bedded all three of the eldest Schuyler sisters), but she has never been blind to the simmering attraction between them. Eliza has simply always had faith in her sister and her husband to never let what lay between them take them anywhere inappropriate. She has always trusted them.

Of course, Eliza had trusted her husband never to betray her at all, and he had certainly made her feel the fool for that, hadn’t he?

Eliza leans back in her chair, rubbing her eyes. That was why she had left, really. Why she’d had to get away, out of the city, away from all of it. Ten months. For ten months she has endured the virulent attacks of Bach’s rag, The Aurora[2]. For ten months, she has endured both the scorn and pity of the citizens of New York, depending on their political sympathies. For ten months, she has lived with her husband eyeing her like a dog who knows it has done wrong and is waiting its punishment. For ten months, she has had Angelica standing at her side and pouring excuse after excuse into her ears, blaming all of it upon Alexander’s enemies.

It is the last that truly makes her angry. While she does not deny that Alexander’s enemies have pounced upon the opportunities afforded them, Eliza dislikes her sister’s attempt to render Alexander blameless in all of this. He is not blameless, far from it. He is the one who made the mad choice to write and publish this pamphlet, announcing his sins to the world in an attempt to vindicate himself of the charges of financial misconduct. Alexander chose that path, chose to write about his… affair in excruciating detail, when a few well-chosen words would have been enough.

Alexander is the one who chose to go to bed with another woman in the first place, chose to conduct an affair behind his wife’s back. Eliza will not wipe away the sin of that. She has never been someone who willfully blinds herself to things, and she will not start now. Her husband must and will bear his share of the blame.

In the end, it all grew too much, having Angelica on one side prattling on about wishing all of the Democratic-Republicans to the devil, and Alexander fluttering around her, wanting to fuss as he so often did after she gave birth but terrified of being slapped down in a fit of temper. All of it left her feeling smothered. She could never have a moment to herself, just to think.

So Eliza had nearly wept with relief when her father had written to her, requesting that she visit him and her mother, and that she bring young Angelica and little William, whom they had only seen once since his birth the previous August. She had leapt at the chance, so grateful for the excuse to get away from New York, from the whispers.

And from both Alexander and Angelica, Eliza admits to herself guiltily. Anything to give her the chance to catch her breath, to take stock of everything on her own terms, not her husband’s or her sister’s.

Eliza looks at the opened letter again, and shakes her head. She ought to have expected this, that her sister wouldn’t be able to resist sending her words after Eliza as she fled. She reminds herself – again – that Angelica means well, and cannot be expected to know that her words have the opposite effect that she intends them to have.

Angelica has crowed about Alexander’s genius for years, delighted in his every achievement and victory. Of course, Eliza has too – she is proud of what Alexander has been able to do in building their nation’s government. But Angelica has never been cognizant of the costs of his work. She has cheered his devotion to his various plans to build the credit, but has never seen how he works himself to the bone, neglecting his health for it. Eliza has never forgotten that Alexander was the first to catch the damned yellow fever, during that dreadful summer in ’93. He had been so buried in his work, dealing with an obstinate Congress and decidedly unhelpful fellow Cabinet members, that he had worn himself out, leaving his body weak and easy prey for the fever to take hold. It had nearly killed him.

And that had not been the only time Alexander had been so overwhelmed that he’d been led into bad choices. He’d refused to take a break, to join her and the children in Albany, and had stayed behind in the city. That had been when Maria Reynolds had walked into his life, Eliza recalls with a sickening twist in her stomach.

Angelica has never seen this. Instead, she sees only Alexander’s greatness, and when faced with his mistakes, she seeks to absolve him of it, blaming everything upon his enemies, so that he might remain the unsullied hero she has always seen him as. But Alexander is not blameless. He is a grown man, brilliant about his work, but careless in so many other things. Careless enough that he makes enemies of those who should be his friends, leaving himself vulnerable to attack where he is at his weakest. And it has led them to this, where Eliza cannot help but watch him when he leaves the house and wonder if Maria Reynolds had been his only bout of infidelity, if there are other women standing in the shadows, waiting to step into the light to further tarnish their lives.

Eliza shakes her head, and gathers up the letters before shoving them into a drawer. Standing up, she leaves the room, trying to shake the thoughts from her head. She came here to think, to clear her head, and she cannot do that if she continues to stare at those pages. She needs to be calm, at peace… so she can decide how she wishes things to be going forward.

[1] Angelica’s letter to Eliza, commonly known as the “Icarus Letter”. I utilize @runawayforthesummer’s theory that it was written in June 1798, of which you can see the details here.

[2] ‘Bach’ being Benjamin Franklin Bach, Benjamin Franklin’s grandson. He was the owner of The Aurora, one of the papers that sided with the Democratic-Republicans and took great pleasure in ripping apart people like Hamilton and Washington in its pages. This is the paper that decided to also take aim at Eliza after the publication of the Reynolds Pamphlet. The oh-so-classy line directed at Eliza about Hamilton ‘lolling in the lap of a harlot’ can be attributed to, if not Bach himself, then to his editors or someone who worked for him. Bach would die just a few months after this ficlet takes place, in September 1798, of a yellow fever outbreak in Philadelphia.

[twothumbsandnostakeincanon]

My brain apparently really likes the idea of wing!whump. How about: After the Nogitsune spits him out, Stiles' wings are wrong. He does his best to hide it, and them, but someone is going to notice sooner or later. Cue Peter being both more intrusive and more empathetic than expected (only one of those is actually a surprise).

Okay. Okay. Fuck, I love this. This is so good.

When the nogitsune split from Stiles, it took the original body and shoved Stiles into the new one. The new one was identical to the old one, down to the last mole, except for one thing: instead of dusty brown feathers, he had black. So black that they seem to suck in light, making it hard to distinguish individual feathers. The flat effect was so uncanny that some of the sillier students at the high school started a rumor that Stiles had his feather wings surgically replaced with bat wings. 

That was ridiculous, of course, and most of the student body and townsfolk just assumed he was using powders or dyes. It’s his teenage right to have a goth phase, so no one looked twice after they’d taken in the new look. The pack looked even less, thinking that they already knew the secret of Stiles’ changed wings. 

But Peter watched Stiles. He’s always watched Stiles, from the beginning, before he could even fully grasp why he was doing it. Because he watched, he’s the only one that noticed how Stiles’ wings do catch the light- but only sometimes. Only in spots, but never the same spot twice. 

It happened at random times as well; after a day long research binge on the town’s latest irritant. During an argumentative pack meeting. Peter even saw it by happenstance at the grocery store. It tugged at Peter’s curiosity. 

It couldn’t be a cosmetic product, or the effect would be more uniform. It might be magical in origin, but Stiles’s magic put off a specific scent since the nogitsune- not an unpleasant one, but consistently noticeable just the same. 

He found the answer thanks to the manticore and his own violent streak. 

Peter had been ready for a tussle- the unsolved mystery of Stiles’ wings left a simmering frustration on the back of his tongue, and he was fully prepared for a cathartic evening with his claws. 

Scott, of course, had wanted to sedate the beast. Peter was even gracious enough to allow him to try all four vials of ketamine before flicking him out of the way and attacking. He deftly dodged the wings, spinning beneath the beasts claws before burying his own in its neck, ripping out its throat and sending arterial spray across the clearing. 

A part of him reveled in the violence of the mess- the evidence of his abilities, the satisfaction of his base instincts. 

The rest of him, however, had an aesthetic to maintain. 

He took his handkerchief out and began to carefully wipe down his wings, ignoring the disgusted complaints of the rest of the pack. Well, the complaints of everyone but Stiles, who was too busy harvesting the spines from the manticore’s tail. Peter looked at him appraisingly, noticing that he hadn’t missed the spray of blood, but was simply more invested in taking advantage of the situation. He’d wiped his face clean, but still had blood spattered across his neck and shoulders, and presumably across his wings, although it was impossible to tell with how dark the feathers were. 

Except. 

Except, they caught the light. In exactly the way that baffled Peter so, in random spots. Spots briefly reflecting the moon. 

Spots that were covered in blood. 

Stiles finished gathering the spines, and did his part in calling up the earth to bury the animal. Everyone parted ways immediately afterward, eager to find the closest bath. 

Peter, however, followed Stiles home. 

He knew he was being allowed to; there was no way Stiles was unaware that he was being followed, and if he truly didn’t want Peter there then he had enough wards to keep him out. 

Instead, Peter found himself easily allowed into Stiles’ room as he was putting away his new bounty. 

“What do you want, Creeperwolf?” Stiles asked, looking up at Peter curiously. Peter shrugged casually. 

“I made a bit of a mess back there-”

Stiles snorts, repeating “a bit” sarcastically under his breath.

“-so I thought it polite to help you groom your feathers.” 

It was fascinating, to see the slight shifts in Stiles’ expression. The ones that mean nothing on his face was real. The ones that mean everyone else has been shut out. 

“No thanks, Uncle Bad Touch-” Stiles said caustically, but Peter interrupted him. 

“They’re quite a mess,” he said lightly, eyeing the wings critically. It’s not really true, the feathers he can see are mostly straight even after their busy night. But it does get the mask on Stiles’ face to drop slightly. 

“My wings are fine. Did you honestly come here to act like a bitchier, cut-rate version of Jonathan Van Ness?”

“I’m not a bitchier cut-rate version of Jonathan Van Ness, Jonathan Van Ness is a less bitchy cut-rate version of me, and how would you even know if they’re a mess? You can’t see.”

Stiles opened his mouth to argue, but Peter was too fast. Too quick, and too determined. 

He slid behind Stiles, ignoring the immediate buffeting of his wings, and peered closely at the coverts. More blood was obvious now that he was looking closely, but it was buried beneath the thick layers of matte black feathers, close to the skin. He carefully moved the top ones aside, stopping when Stiles let out a pained hiss and froze. 

There was blood everywhere. 

Broken pin feathers scattered his skin, the collection of calami much denser than normal. Bent rachis and torn vanes could be seen all over the place, once again hidden beneath the thick layer of top feathers. 

A memory of burnt wings, and the pain that came from deformed feathers constantly breaking made him shudder.

“Christ,” he breathed out. 

Stiles hunched a little, clearly bracing for more pain, babbling. 

“I can’t- they just grow that way now. They’re so thick, there isn’t enough space for the new feathers to come in. They’re constantly breaking. Even if I had time to groom for hours every day-” 

“This happened after the nogitsune?” Peter interrupted. 

Stiles nodded, and then carefully pulled away, turning to look at Peter, who finally dropped his hands. 

“Something about the- the way the nogitsune made this body… I heal faster now. I don’t need as much sleep.” He scoffed out a tiny laugh and looked away before turning his dry gaze back to Peter. “My hair is thicker too.” He sighed. “It’s not like it’s a real problem-”

“The blood on your feathers is evidence to the contrary,” Peter interrupted again, voice tight.

Stiles went silent.

“Let me help you with your wings,” Peter said. Insisted, really, even if Stiles’ didn’t know that yet. 

“Peter-” Stiles sighed. “It’s not just that I don’t have time. It- it really fucking hurts, okay?” He grit his teeth. “The amount of time it would take to straighten everything out daily… I’d rather just bear the pain of some feathers breaking than spending hours trying not to scream.” He jut out his jaw, as if daring Peter to mock him for wanting to avoid the hurt. 

As if there was anyone who understood the bearing and avoidance of pain more than Peter.

Instead, Peter lightly said, “If only you had someone offering to groom you who is also capable of taking away your pain.” 

Stiles’ mouth fell open. He clearly hadn’t considered that.

“Lay down,” Peter demanded, only a little surprised when Stiles actually did so. He placed one hand on the small of Stiles’ back between his wings, rubbing his thumb back and forth as he began to drain the pain of the broken feathers. 

It was difficult to stay calm in the face of evidence that Stiles had been bearing this much pain since the nogitsune without anyone in the pack noticing. 

With his other hand, he began to clean and straighten feathers. 

Stiles fell asleep almost immediately, as surprising as not beneath Peter’s hands, given the situation and their night. Peter continued to work for hours. He groomed as best he could under the onslaught of sharp quills and thick down, considering the various medical and magical options available that might help the problem. 

By the time he finished, his own hands were beginning to ache. Stiles stirred just as he opened the window to leave. 

“Peter?” he asked, voice rough, not quite fully awake. 

“I’ll be back tomorrow,” Peter assured him. “I’ll groom you again and we can talk about how to fix the problem.” 

Stiles stared at him for a moment, sleep rumpled and more relaxed than Peter had seen in months. Then he collapsed back down to his pillow. 

“You’re weird,” he muttered, and then-

“Thank you, Creeperwolf.” 

Peter smirked, and shut the window behind him. 

[thejonzone]

Riverdale is the Best Show You’ve Written Off

About once a month, a tweet will go around, reading something like “I can’t believe Netflix cancelled [SHOW X], but Riverdale is still on?!? *eye roll emoji, angry cussing emoji*.” It can be difficult to read tweets like these, because I like Riverdale. But I understand why it has struggled to keep an audience-- there is a perception that the show has gone completely off the rails, a chaos of hot actors in their mid-20s playing glamorous high school sociopaths, with the show choosing excess over narrative cohesion. That perception is pretty accurate. It’s an easy show to write off and easy to make fun of, especially because, as a CW show, it’s ostensibly geared to teens. So it brings me no pleasure to say that Riverdale, currently in its 5th season, has reached a renaissance, and its episodes so far this season represent its high-water mark. 

To appreciate how stunning and exciting Riverdale’s new direction is, it’s important to understand how we got here.

In the first season, a murder in the titular town revealed an underbelly of thugs, power brokers, and shady backroom rulers, all vying for control with gothic morbidity. What followed after that season though, was something else entirely. 

Riverdale, ramping up during Seasons 2 through 4, became a beautiful mess. I think it’s important to state that no other show on television is even attempting to do what Riverdale did/is doing. The show is, at any one point, 5-7 wholly different shows. There is a season’s worth of plot per episode. It’s storytelling mania and in-real-time dementia. I don’t remember what happened at the end of last episode because SO much happened. And besides, coherence is overrated! Give me hot actors, give me drug-addicted mobsters, give me creepy principals! On Riverdale, the parents are both former teen heartthrobs and serial killers, children operate underground speakeasies, and for some reason not one therapist has realized they could make a fortune helping our cast work through the intense psychological terror and emotional abuse they receive every episode.

This show is beyond pastiche, hyper-loaded with reference. My roommate and I had a joke that the show’s third season could be mapped to a quadrant of influences: Twin Peaks, True Detective, The Sopranos, and Gossip Girl. At any point Riverdale was acknowledging and playing into the influence of one of these shows. Season Four doubled down on the show’s horror anthology tendency. No one wants you to miss the references being made. You know that menacing boarding school Jughead attends in Season Four? You’d be right If it reminded you of Donna Tartt’s A Secret History. After all, consider Jughead’s classmate, whose name is Donna Sweet. Maybe you picked up on the violence simmering underneath the surface of Jughead’s other classmate, Bret Easton-Elli--  I mean, Bret Weston-Wallis.

Every week, the show seems primed for failure, attempting to juggle more storylines than possible or even necessary. The show is like a house of cards that has already fallen, and yet the writers are somehow still haphazardly adding more cards to the top. “Be reasonable!” I would plead. To no avail. And that’s the thrill of it. The plotlines are secondary to the spectacle. The show is a celebration and parody of violent legacy dramas, camp, teen horror, canonical literature, and anything else it can stuff under the hood, as much an ode to other pieces of media as it is an original work itself. 

But now, something completely different is happening. The beginning of Season Five brought an end to the seasons-long saga the show felt trapped in. Archie, Veronica, Betty, and Jughead graduated high school, and the show flashed forward seven years. What might be considered a hokey technique was one of the best decisions the writers ever did. Because now we have a blank slate for our main cast. The writers effectively cut the fat from three seasons of violent, ridiculous maximalism. And it’s psychically refreshing.

At the heart of any good sitcom, we just want to see our main characters hanging out together. Change is part of life, but it shouldn’t be in television. Which is why this new season is so exciting-- Riverdale is now in the process of bringing its four main characters back from their adult lives and re-engaging them in the deadly politics of their hometown. Pop Tate, the owner-manager of Pop’s, Riverdale’s diner, is retiring, and Archie gets the gang back in town to celebrate the man who helped make the diner such a great hang-out spot. In the words of Jughead, “You gave us a home, Pop.” Like so mant other sitcoms before it, Riverdale used Pop’s to establish its characters and their relationships to each other.

I grew up on Seinfeld so I’ve always been attracted to the idea of the diner. The pandemic has made me yearn even harder for the sitcom diner, that idealistic place where all my friends are, where people enter with problems to be solved, drama to be explained, good news to be celebrated. Riverdale’s acknowledgment of Pop and his diner as the show’s connective tissue is a grounding and human choice. It works fantastically to set up this upcoming season, where our gang must confront the newest nefarious plot for control over the soul of Riverdale.

No doubt the show will continue its pattern of naming and spoofing genre. Veronica, in her adult life, had an Uncut Gems-style few scenes where she works as a charismatic (of course) diamond merchant. She married a possessive, boring guy who’s only characteristic seems to be that his voice is *exactly* like Veronica’s megalomaniac dad, Hiram. Something something Freud, something something daddy sexy. And credit where credit is due, Mark Consuelos is really hot.

Jughead is a writer now, in the most white guy college freshman fantasy of being a writer possible. He attended the Iowa Writers Workshop as an undergrad, something that is definitely not possible. He’s written a hit book but now suffers from *gasp* writer’s block?? He’s a cool guy writer who, in his opening montage, gets recognized by, hit on, and then has sex with a college-aged fan. Back in Riverdale, Jug writes a speech for Pop’s retirement and sends it to his agent. His agent is smitten with the work, calling it “tragic americana” and proclaiming that Jughead’s next book will be titled “Elegy for a Small Town”. This is almost certainly a reference to J.D. Vance’s bad book, and I’m sure the show will be bringing in more elements of “tragic” “americana” as the season unfolds. 

Betty is FBI in training, because as the show has loved to tell us, Betty has “the serial killer gene”, but is using it for good. For the record, her dad was a serial killer, and her brother was a serial killer. And it’s not like her mom or sister can cast the first stone. Betty’s endured enough trauma to fill 100 lives with unending pain and I’m sure the show will have no trouble heaping more on top. Already in the new season we’ve seen flashbacks to some point during the time jump when Betty was taken hostage, in what’s clearly a homage to The Silence of the Lambs. 

And then there’s Archie. I don’t know if anyone knows what to do with the guy. Played by K.J. Apa, who is both really good-looking with his shirt off and a god-awful actor, Archie has been in the army. The show is using him to shill for the military-industrial complex. 

I’ve long joked that the Riverdale writers have no idea what they’re doing. But through a global pandemic affecting TV production and *the* major narrative complication in any high school-set show (graduation), the Riverdale writers have seamlessly transitioned the show to a new stasis. Past seasons are informing this one, but we aren’t bogged down by the details in this new season. The bigger joke, of course, is that the writers have known exactly what they’ve been doing this whole time, and I’m just an idiot. Well I mean, of course I’m an idiot. I use television to regulate my emotions and simulate a static friend group that doesn’t leave or change. And Riverdale is perfect for that. If a renaissance is a rebirth, well then my friends, cut the umbilical cord and save the placenta to put in pills, because Riverdale is cranking out episodes that are better than ever.

[steppedoffaflight]

Summer’s a Knife - Chapter 7

Catch up on Chapter 6 here

To reward Van for his vulnerability you send him a video of your hand underneath the lace, your fingers moving against yourself. It felt good, sure, but most importantly it filmed good. Van seems to think so, too, judging by his next video.

You sigh in amusement at his enthusiasm. You forget how easy riling up men can be.

Maybe you’d cut someone else off at this point, but Van’s eagerness was endearing. You continue to send him videos of you touching yourself, playing up some soft moans into the microphone. After a few exchanges Van sends a video of his grand finale, complete with his own noises in the background. It’s the one bit out of everything you wish you could’ve saved.

Faking an orgasm is strictly against the rules, so you decide to close off snapchat, coming back to your texts with him instead. In an exhilarated rush you let your glasses of wine do the typing as you send Hope that makes London more bearable.

or

As always, Mary keeps you out of your comfort zone.

Word count: ~5.6k

Chapter Seven May 2019

Van leaves for the U.K. only days after your accident. You insist on being the one to drop him off at the airport, waking up barely past midnight on a workday in order to get him to LAX for his six AM flight. He’d fought tooth-and-nail against you being the one to take him, insisting on catching a ride with one of the other boys, but to be honest you’d wanted to see him one last time. You wanted to reassure him that you were a normal, functioning person, and not the traumatized mess he’d seen that night. 

He’d given you a tight hug over the console as the car idled on the curb in front of his terminal before getting out and grabbing his bags, heading into the hustle and bustle of the airport. You don’t take off immediately but Van doesn’t look back. You watch him examine his phone through the glass doors before he shuffles off, rolling his suitcase behind him. 

For the first time, you don’t have to wonder if you’ll see Van again. You’re absolutely certain you will, considering you drive away from the airport in his Range Rover. 

It’s weird how comfortable you become driving it. You do have to text Van occasionally through the week with questions, but eventually you’ve made yourself right at home, going so far as to even set some of your own radio station presets. Hopefully he doesn’t mind, but you’d tried to listen to his and it just wasn’t your style. At this rate your indie-rock repertoire consisted of only Catfish and the one Sam Fender song you’d listened to after meeting him. And you were okay with that. 

Mary has you come over Friday after work for a girl’s night. She insists it’s because Theo is headed to a bachelor party and she’ll be bored alone, but you get the feeling she’s been worried about you since your accident. She texts you more often than usual, asking about your muscle stiffness and the cut on your thigh. It’d been infected, but cleared up quickly with some first aid ointment you’d had around the house. You were still banged up and had some nasty bruises, but overall you felt lucky things hadn’t been worse. 

The plans tonight are tame, a sure sign of Mary’s worry. While she’d usually jump on a girl’s night as an opportunity to head to a club, something you two haven’t done in forever, she insists on renting a movie and changing into pajamas as soon as you’re over. You have chinese delivered for dinner, and wash it down with a bottle of wine Mary had carefully selected for this evening. You two watch a comedy as you eat your food straight out of the paper containers, something funny about divorced women who decide to take a road trip and make impulsive decisions. 

The whole living room rings out in shrieks of pain when one of the characters decides to get a bikini wax. You both cringe but can’t take your eyes off of the screen. 

“God, remember when I got that wax?” Mary winces.

You remember it vividly, even though it was years ago. Mary had just started dating someone new and during your brow appointments she spur of the moment decided to get a brazillian wax done. One thing you appreciated about Mary’s boldness was your ability to learn from her mistakes; You know now that you will never, ever get a wax. 

“I could never, ever, forget,” You tell her somberly as you recall the memory. She had waited until you were done with your brow wax so that you could be in the room with her, holding her hand. It had been traumatic for you both.

“He didn’t even care,” Mary shakes her head in distaste. “All that pain for nothing. He didn’t say one word about it when we fucked the next time.”

She spends a moment simmering in her anger before she shrugs, the clouds clearing. “It made for some great nudes, though. I used them when I first started talking to Theo and he still has them saved to this day.”

“No way? Even with recent ones?” 

“What recent ones,” Mary snorts. “I haven’t sent him any in forever. He keeps asking but it’s like, I have to be in a certain mood, you know?”

You nod in understanding. “For sure. I’m never in the mood to photograph myself in fluorescent bathroom lighting.”

“Right, exactly!” Mary takes a long drink of her wine, finishing off her glass. “Now that I have a dimmer in the bathroom, though, it’s so much nicer. Turn it down to a nice glow, ugh.” She gives a chef’s kiss to the air. “So nice.”

She refills her wine glass, topping yours up without being asked. Your attention drifts back to the movie.

“I should take some new ones,” Mary muses.

“You should,” You encourage her.

“No, like, right now,” She says suddenly, sitting up. “I never have the house to myself. I should take some to send to Theo. Gotta keep his eyes off of the strippers, you know.”

You scoff at the idea that Theo would pay anyone else besides Mary a glance. He was head over heels for her. But you can see that Mary’s been hit with an unstoppable lightning bolt of inspiration, already shuffling her blanket aside so she can stand up.

“You gotta help me.” She hits pause on the movie, effectively changing the course of the night. “You always get my angles right.”

You sigh, but know there’s no use in arguing. You start to get up as well.

“I’ll grab more wine,” Mary says cheerfully, bouncing away towards the kitchen. 

“You should take some for your man, too!” She calls from the other room.

You let out a dry laugh. “I don’t have a man.”

“Sure you do,” Mary smirks as she reenters the living room with an unopened bottle of wine, “You’re driving his Range Rover, aren’t you?”

“I’m driving my friend’s Range Rover,” You reply. “He was very clear that we are friends.”

“But he’s a friend that would appreciate a nice pic of you.”

“I’m sure he would. But I’m in the ugliest underwear ever, anyway.” You flash her the overworn pair you had on that was probably overdue to be thrown out. 

“I have so many cute pairs!”

“We are not the same size!”

“Sure we are!” Mary has started her trip upstairs, and you follow along with both of your wine glasses. “You can fit my underwear for sure!”

“But not your bras!” Your ribcage was definitely wider than Mary’s.

“We can finesse them,” She insists. “We just need some safety pins. Or a hair tie. I dunno, but we’ll make it work.”

Mary’s place included a stunning walk in closet that you’ve always envied. It was attached to the master bedroom and included sets of drawers that kept all of her folded clothes organized. Theo clearly did not share your enthusiasm for the drawers, considering his clothes were in a heap on the floor underneath his hanging rack. 

“He’s disgusting,” Mary shakes her head when she sees you notice Theo’s clothes. “I can’t get him to fold a fucking shirt no matter how hard I try. He just wants to hang everything! And there’s not enough space for that!” She gestures passionately to Theo’s hanging rod, which is indeed overflowing. 

“Anyway, pick a set,” She slides open a few drawers, revealing matching bra and underwear sets. Lingerie had always been Mary’s forte. 

Mary snatches a black lace set. The bra is clearly not intended for coverage purposes, as it’s obvious from glancing at it that her nipples will show right through the lace. You carefully consider a few other bras that catch your eye, but they’re all push-ups with thick padding. Something about Mary’s sheer bra just feels like it would catch Van off guard.

“I want the set you have,” You pout, hoping she’ll politely hand it over.

“I love this set so much,” Mary sighs. “I wanted to buy two sets at the store the day I tried it on because it was so incredible, but they didn’t have another one in black and all the other colors didn’t have the same oomf, you know?” She rifles through the drawers she has open before kneeling down, opening more. 

“But they did have this one,” She presses a lacy bra into your hands. It’s identical to hers, except navy blue instead of black. “Does that work?”

You unravel the flimsy lace, marveling at how sheer it is. “Yes!”

“And for underwear,” Mary tuts, browsing her drawers again. “I don’t have the matching ones for those, but these are kinda the same color.” 

The underwear is only one shade lighter than the bra, which won’t be noticeable in pictures. The problem is that it’s a thong, with a waistband that’s meant to settle high on your hips. 

“I can’t wear these,” You sigh in disappointment when you unravel the delicate strips of fabric barely thick enough to be held together at the seams. “I look terrible in thongs.”

“Nuh-uh! High waisted thongs are totally different. Trust me! Once you get the waistband right it makes your ass look so round!”

Already your heart was sinking in anticipation of trying on ill-fitting clothes and being too discouraged to take any pictures in them. “Alright,” You sigh, not willing to argue about it. 

Mary heads back into the bedroom, shedding her pajamas before slipping into the lingerie. You follow her to the bathroom, where she plays with the dimmer while you gulp down more wine to soothe your nerves. 

“Take a pic,” Mary commands, halfheartedly posing. You do, and then she reviews it, adjusting the dimmer again as she mutters to herself.

“Another one.”

When she reviews this one, her face lights up. “Perfect,” She tells you, pressing her phone back into the palm of your hand. “Put the wine down, and let’s do this.”

Mary is stunning on camera. Taking pictures comes as easily to her as everything else. She’s not even the slightest bit shy about you being the one to take them, shamelessly sitting down on the edge of the bathtub and spreading her legs, running her fingers provocatively over her thighs. She’s right about the dim lighting making all the difference. Every photo you take of her looks sendable, even if she wrinkles her nose when she reviews them.

When she’s done she’s got a huge selection to chose from, each picture slightly different then the last. She sends one focused on her bra to Theo immediately, and saves the rest for a different time. 

“Now you!” She exclaims, excitedly clapping her hands together. 

If you were nervous in the beginning, watching Mary so flawlessly pose has definitely ruined your confidence by now. You hesitate, eyeing your chosen clothes on the bed.

“No excuses!” Mary cries when she sees your hesitation. “Didn’t you say Van was in London? What better way to keep him thinking about you then this?”

She’s right. For all you knew he could be sleeping in someone else’s bed right now.

You heave a defeated sigh, slipping off your clothes before shimmying into Mary’s. 

The bra does need some finessing, Mary cleverly linking two safety pins together to add the necessary length to the band. It’s uncomfortable but it works, and your nipples do show right through the lace as you’d intended. 

You hold your breath as you shimmy into the thong. The lace uncomfortably slips between your thighs, disappearing into your ass. You grimace down at yourself as you adjust the waistband, unhappy with the way it looks. 

“This doesn’t look right,” You sigh when you examine yourself in the bathroom mirror. 

“Come here,” Mary demands, entering the bathroom with you. Her cold fingers make you flinch as the fusses with the lace, picking at it until it’s positioned to her satisfaction. “This is how it’s supposed to look.”

When you look back in the mirror to see her handiwork, you’re stunned. Her nitpicking had worked some serious magic on the fit. She’d tugged the waistband up until it rested right below your belly button, and then had tugged the sides even higher. The high leg cut of the material revealed extra skin, successfully giving the illusion that you have a more hourglass figure with a larger ass than you actually had. 

“See?” Mary smiles at your reflection through the mirror. “Now time for the magic.”

Unfortunately, however, you are not as photogenic as Mary. Although Mary dismisses any gripes you have about the photos she’s taking, you can’t shake the gut feeling that nothing you were doing was working. You didn’t feel confident enough to send a single one of these photos to Van. You shy away from taking photos on a normal day, let alone in lingerie with someone else in the room. Eventually you grab your phone from Mary’s hands.

“This isn’t working,” You huff.

“But it is,” Mary argues, “You look incredible!”

“Okay, well maybe I need to take some alone,” You compromise. “You’re giving me stage fright!”

“How am I giving you stage fright? I’m telling you how hot you look!”

“Please,” You plead with her, “Just give me some time to try to get something halfway decent.” 

“Suit yourself,” Mary shrugs, swigging the wine on the counter straight from the bottle. “But you’re not allowed to leave until I see proof you’ve sent him one.”

With that she leaves you to it, softly closing the bathroom door behind her. 

You wish she would’ve left the wine.

Now that you’re alone, the pressure is on. You open up the camera, praying you’ll have some good luck.

Without being watched things go much smoother. Within a handful of shots you’ve gotten one that you like. You’re sitting on the edge of the bathtub, the warm glow from the mirror lights lighting up the skin on your chest. The details of the lace are visible enough, but the dark color of your nipples through the fabric steals the focus. Your hand is suggestively cupping one breast, your pointer finger dangerously close to brushing your nipple. There’s not enough light in the room to illuminate any of the background behind your body. The entire focus is on the bra, which consumes the entire faceless shot. 

The moment you feel the thrill of having taken a decent photo you take advantage of the feeling. You rush to send it to Van before you chicken out. At the very least, you’ve now satisfied Mary’s requirements and can now be released from the bathroom.

You forget exactly what the time difference is between L.A. and London, but you think it’s something significant, so Van probably wouldn’t be looking at your text right this second. But you’re still riding a wave of adrenaline, so you decide to take a few more in anticipation of his reaction. 

You try out one of Mary’s poses, legs spread open and a hand suggestively on your thigh. Taking it yourself adds something extra to the angle the way it’s looking down onto your lap, capturing your perspective. 

Your phone buzzes in your hand in the middle of snapping another pic. You almost drop your phone in surprise.

Christ, is all Van’s sent. 

Do you like it? You type back nervously.

Yeah

Van’s lack of emotion is typical, but you’re desperate to prompt something more from him tonight. You send the photo of your open thighs as a follow up.

There you go, You send underneath it with a winky face. 

Immediately the typing indicator comes up. Got any more? 

Do you have snapchat? Your heart races as you send it. 

Van’s reply is one word: his username. 

You scramble to open up snapchat, adding him immediately. He accepts you with as much eagerness. 

Say hi!, the app prompts you as soon as you two are deemed friends. You click the prompt, opening up the camera screen. 

Piggybacking off of the photo of your thighs, you dare to take a video in the same position. This time you let your fingers brush over the lace covering you, cutting off the video as soon as it looks like you’re going to tuck a fingertip under the fabric. 

As quick as it’s sent, you watch the status on the app change to opened. 

When a notification from Van suddenly appears, you tap it without a second thought.

Your gasp audibly echoes around the small room. It’s a clip of Van’s briefs, Van zooming in on the fabric in an attempt to emphasize how hard he is. There’s one that loads immediately after. He’s undressed now, jerking himself off. 

“Are you okay in there?” Mary knocks on the door. 

“Yes!” You exclaim breathlessly. “Go away! I’m having a convo with Van!”

“You have to show me everything when you’re done!” Mary yells through the door, retreating when you hurriedly agree. Thankfully your actual texting thread is mild compared to what you’re about to send. 

To reward Van for his vulnerability you send him a video of your hand underneath the lace, your fingers moving against yourself. It felt good, sure, but most importantly it filmed good. Van seems to think so, too, judging by his next video.

You sigh in amusement at his enthusiasm. You forget how easy riling up men can be. 

Maybe you’d cut someone else off at this point, but Van’s eagerness was endearing. You continue to send him videos of you touching yourself, playing up some soft moans into the microphone. After a few exchanges Van sends a video of his grand finale, complete with his own noises in the background. It’s the one bit out of everything you wish you could’ve saved.

Faking an orgasm is strictly against the rules, so you decide to close off snapchat, coming back to your texts with him instead. In an exhilarated rush you let your glasses of wine do the typing as you send Hope that makes London more bearable. 

Christttt Van sends again. Trust me it did 

You emerge from the bathroom in all your flushed, disheveled glory. Mary throws her phone down on the bed when you come into the bedroom.

“What happened?” She shouts in excitement, bouncing on the bed. “What’d you send him?”

You open up your texting thread and pass it over. “We only texted for a sec.”

Mary’s eyes widen. “You snapchatted him?” 

“I mean…” You shrug, blushing. “We snapchatted each other.”

Mary beams in approval. “‘Hope that makes London more bearable’,” She reads out loud before cackling. “Jesus, girl, what has gotten into you?”

“I don’t know!” You exclaim, laughing. “I never do shit like this!”

“I’ve never seen you act like this,” Mary agrees, passing your phone back. “Van is just bringing out a Y/N like never before.”

“Oh, stop. It’s just been forever since I’ve been around someone I really like. That’s all. You know I had that awful dating streak that was so bad I literally gave up.”

“That’s true, I do remember talking you into giving Van a chance,” Mary smirks. “At this rate I’m waiting for a wedding invitation.”

You wrinkle your nose. “No way.”

“You wouldn’t marry him?”

“Van doesn’t seem like the husband type,” You shrug. “And I don’t even know him, so… Definitely saying no to that proposal.”

Mary hums like she doesn’t quite believe you. “I dunno…” She singsongs. “He acts like he loves you. The whole racing out in a thunderstorm thing? And he gives head. He loves you more than Theo loves me, that’s for sure.”

You roll your eyes at her joke. “He’s just very nice,” You brush her off. “I guess he can afford to be extra nice, like the car thing. But he’s never put out any feelers to even be my boyfriend, so I don’t think he’ll be my husband anytime soon.”

“And what about you?”

You turn around so Mary can undo the safety pins on the bra. “What?”

“Like what kind of feelings do you have for him?”

You think for a moment. “I like what we have. He’s fun to be around.”

“You’re not falling in love with him?”

“No!” You giggle.

“Not even a little bit?”

“Oh God, I think everyone’s a little bit in love with him. Did you see everyone at that show?”

“You’re right.” Mary’s done unhooking the bra, and you shimmy out of it. “It even rubbed off on me a little. If things don’t work out can I make my move?”

You two erupt in a fit of giggles at the idea.

\\

The next day slips by, lazy and slow. You and Mary go to bed late, wake up even later, and take your sweet time heading out to grab some breakfast. By the time you’re sitting down to eat it’s already edging towards late afternoon. Theo stumbles in, hungover and exhausted from last night’s adventures. He’s got his own hangover cure in hand, and you three eat together while Mary and you tease him about the strippers. 

Afterwards you all settle in on the couch. Mary and Theo are in the middle of some series, and you watch it for lack of anything better to do even if you don’t understand the plot. They seem quite passionate over whatever’s happening, and that’s more amusing than the actual show. You manage to sneak a few clips of the two of them angrily debating over a character and send them to Van on snapchat. He texts you a laughing face in response. 

Before you know it it’s dinnertime, and you never ended up going back to your own place. You’re grateful to be so close with someone that staying over a second time is an unspoken agreement as you all argue over where to order dinner from. If anything, Mary seems happy that she can keep a close eye on you for a little longer.

The argument somehow ends with everyone working together to make spaghetti. Theo takes over meatball production, you’re in charge of concocting a pot of sauce, and Mary takes on the extraordinary task of both DJing and boiling the prepackaged noodles. There’s no garlic bread, so you all settle for baking regular slices of bread piled with butter, cheese and spices. Despite everyone’s differences in technique and flavor preferences, by some magic it all turns out perfect.

After your late dinner you retire to the guest bedroom, which you’ve stayed in many times over the years. But after a day of being lazy you feel restless, your body feeling rested enough to resist sleep. You pass the time by scrolling mindlessly on social media.

What are you up to? 

Van’s not really one to text first, so when the notification slides onto your screen you jump at something to entertain you. Can’t sleep :( you confess.

In the same boat Van replies. 

You snort to yourself. Aren’t you always lol 

Haha yeah. Another bubble from him: Doesn’t make it easier though

I bet, You type back. I’m sure time differences don’t help. 

Deffo not. 

As you try to think of a response, Van sends another. Where are you?

Laying in bed. Stayed over at Mary’s again.

Typing indicator. Then: Can you manage a sec alone?

I don’t have any more pics Van. I sent you the only two good ones I took. You punctuate the message with a laughing emoji. 

Highly doubt that

That you only took two good ones I mean

But actually I was wondering if I could give you a call

At that you perk up. Yeah you can call!

Van doesn’t respond to your text, but after about five agonizing, uncertain minutes your phone lights up with his call.

“Hello,” You greet him immediately. 

“Hi.” You don’t realize how much you miss Van’s voice until you hear it. “What time is it for you?”

“Midnight,” You tell him after peeking at your screen to double check. “What time is it there?”

“Eight.”

“At night?”

“No, in the morning.”

The weirdness of talking to someone who’s existing in a whole different time of day settles over your skin. “That’s weird.”

Van laughs. “Are you alone?”

“Yep,” You tell him, smoothing the comforter over your legs to keep your hands busy. “Why are you being so paranoid?”

“Paranoid?” Van sounds both amused and offended. “About what?”

“About me being alone! Is you calling me some sort of secret?”

“No!” Van chuckles. “I just want to make sure we’re speaking in private.”

You start to catch his drift, trying to suppress your smile so he doesn’t hear it down the line. “Oh? And why’s that?”

“You can’t sleep, right?” Van’s voice is low.

The sudden shift in the tone of his voice makes your stomach flip. You try to keep your tone breezy. “It’s kind of annoying, yeah.”

“It is,” Van agrees. 

“But it’s morning for you,” You tease him, “Shouldn’t you be heading to work?”

“Not ‘til later. Which is fucking great because I didn’t sleep a wink all night.”

“Oh? That sounds rough.”

“Wasn’t so bad. Wrote a pretty good song.”

“You wrote a song?” You furrow your brows in confusion even if nobody’s there to see. “Your album just came out!”

“I never stop writing,” Van brushes you off. “Anytime an idea hits I play around with it.”

You wonder if he writes down these songs in that leather notebook you’d seen at his house. “I see.”

“Yeah.” Van’s voice suddenly goes back to the lower tone he’d been using before you two had gotten distracted. “Anyway, I thought we’d help each other out.”

“Help each other out? How?” You deliver your question in the same mock-cluelessness of a cheesy porn actress. 

“Oh, Christ,” Van’s quiet laughter bubbles over the line. “Will you fucking quit?”

“Quit what?” You maintain the cluelessness. “I don’t understand what you’re asking me to do, Mr. McCann.”

Van laughs so hard it turns to a coughing fit. “That’s fucking sick. Mr. McCann is my dad.”

“Ew,” You agree quietly. “But what did you have in mind?”

“Thought we could both get off, if you’d like to get focused.”

“Don’t blame this on me,” You argue mildly. “Where do we start?”

“Pants off and getting comfortable, I suppose.”

“Yeah, okay.” You set the phone aside while you wriggle out of your underwear and debate what position you’d like to be in. Laying down worked fine, but the pillows on the bed have the gears in your brain whirring. You internally debate whether using one of the guest room pillows is disgusting. You were pretty sure you were the only one that stayed in here, though. And you could just use one and concoct some sort of reason they’d need to wash it later. You promise yourself the latter and grab one of the ones at the bottom of the stack. 

You hear the noise of Van speaking, but the phone isn’t pressed to your ear.

“Huh?” You ask when you pick it back up. “I set the phone down.”

“Are you ready?” Van asks.

“No, I’m still getting comfortable.” You smush the phone into the crook of your neck while you puff the flattened pillow and straddle it. 

“What? How long does that take?”

“Shush,” You demand. “It’s a science. Anyway, I’m comfortable now.” You sit back on your knees, feeling the cool fabric press between your legs.

“What’s comfortable?”

Your cheeks heat up in embarrassment that you have to explain it. But you suppose you better get over that quick, considering it’s the only way this’ll work. “Um, I’m using a pillow.”

“Like that show we watched?”

You feel your face burning hotter even though he was being genuine. “Yeah. Like that. You’re doing this too, right?”

“Course I’m doing it too,” Van assures you. “Can’t let you have all the fun.”

You chew at a piece of dead skin on your lip. “So what position are you in?”

“On my back on my bed. The usual.”

In your mind you picture his bedroom twenty minutes away, even though that’s not where he is. The fact you have no idea what’s going on on his end is disorienting. “Are you hard?” 

“Uh, just about,” Van’s voice is raspy. “Figure once you get going I’ll be there.”

“You want me to start first?” Your voice wavers the tiniest bit from nerves.

“Yeah. Talk me through it.”

“Okay…” You trail off nervously. You switch your phone into your other hand so that you can reach between your legs with your dominant hand. All of this talking has already had a noticeable effect on your body, which is instantly happy at some light friction. 

“I, uh-” You shiver at your own touch. “Just starting off slow.”

Van makes a small, strained noise. It’s so slight it almost sounds like background noise, but there’s the noise of his exhale against the speaker. Encouraged by his response, you search for something more to say.

“With circles,” You add. “You know, uh, how you start off with bigger circles?” The idea of him being the one to touch you makes you shudder. “Like that. You always get it right.”

“Yeah?” Van breathes.

“Yeah,” You sigh. Your fingers speed up, your hips rocking against the pillow to magnify the sensation. “Did you start yet?”

“I did,” Van confirms. You shut your eyes tight and try to imagine him.

“Do you use something?” You ask, desperate to be able to sharpen the image in your mind’s eye. 

“Hm?”

“Like… lotion? Or lube?” Your fingertips rub over a spot that sends a shock up your spine and you can’t control your gasp. 

Van starts speaking but stutters in surprise at your noise. “No,” He finally grits out. “I- I do the old lick-the-palm-of-my-hand. That’s it though.”

You’ve narrowed down the spot throbbing for attention, a moan slipping down the line to Van. “Fuck,” You sigh, your legs widening. You press against the pillow harder, riding it with the same enthusiasm you ride Van with. “I wish I had my vibrator,” You whine.

His breath hitches. “You’ve got one?”

“At home in my drawer I do.” Thinking about pressing it into you while it buzzes on the perfect setting makes you twitch desperately against your fingertips. “Fuck, I wish I had it so bad.”

“What would you do with it, though?” Van pants. You can clearly hear the soft clicking of Van’s foreskin slipping against any precome, giving you a sense of his rhythm. 

“Slow down,” You plead, trying to focus and match your tight circles to his pace. “I’m trying to go at the same pace as you.”

Van’s breathing is jagged as you hear him slow his pace slightly.

You try to think up some sort of response to Van’s question about the vibrator. The only reason you were craving it so bad is because Van was out of town. It doesn’t see the light of day when he’s in L.A..

“I only use it when you’re not here,” You confess, too exhilarated to censor yourself. “So if you were around I wouldn’t be doing shit with it.”

“Oh fuck,” Van sounds dangerously close to the edge. “I miss you. I wish I was fucking you.”

His voice sounds raw. You replay the way he says he misses you over and over in your mind. 

“I miss you too,” You admit, your voice cracking. “I’ve been thinking about riding you this entire time.” 

“I’m gonna come,” Van pants.

“I know,” You tell him. “I can hear it.”

There’s the frantic noise of his pace speeding up before Van’s moaning down the line. You squeeze your eyes shut so hard it hurts just so you can picture his face, recalling all the details you remember when you’d jerked him off over your stomach. 

You focus on your hazy fantasy of riding Van and getting to see his face tense like that until you’re over the edge, breathing his name into the microphone. 

A blissful silence follows as you both come back down. You allow your bodyweight to slump sideways, dramatically rolling off of the pillow. 

“What was that?” Van croaks.

“Me readjusting,” You say, hesitantly giving the pillow a slight sniff. It smells like sex. You cram it back into the bottom of the pile, reminding yourself to think up a lie in the morning. 

“Oh. Think you can sleep now?”

“Yeah.” You wince at the way your thighs ache from your position. “Definitely wore myself out. What about you?”

“Exhausted. Ready to catch some rest.”

“Okay.” You yawn. “I’ll let you go.”

“I miss you,” Van says again earnestly. “I’ll be back in the States soon.”

It’s one thing to say things spur of the moment during sex, but Van repeating his declaration stuns you. 

“Miss you,” You reply instinctually. “So does my vibrator. It’s in need of a vacation.”

Your joke lands as intended, your heart swelling as Van breaks out into a belly laugh. 

“Christ,” He catches his breath enough to say. “You’re somethin’ else.” You hear the faint click of his lighter. “Stay on the phone and have a smoke with me?”

“I can’t,” You groan in disappointment. “I don’t have any on me.”

“Oh. Alright. I’ll let you get to sleep, then.” He sounds equally as disappointed. 

“Okay. Text me.”

“I will. Goodnight.”

“Night.”

\\

[vs-redemption]

Bad Day (Dabi x GN!Reader)

This wasn’t a request, but it’s been something in my mind that I’ve wanted to write for a few days. I’ve had some family drama the past couple weeks and whenever I’m sad I think about Dabi lol I’m not sure why. Anyway, there’s a whole second part of this that I was planning to write, but I don’t know if I’ll ever get to it so I’ll post this by itself for now!

ANYWAY! My requests are still open so feel free to check out the rules and my masterlist.

⚠️ There are some suggestive themes (nothing crazy)

⚠️ There are mentions of alcohol consumption

It had been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. Actually, why sugar coat it? Things had not been great for a while. Today had just been one the times when everything finally came to a boil. With your mind filled with anger, you make your way to the only place you can think to go. You crash through the doors of the tiny bar where the League of Villains stayed in secret, not bothering to hide your rage as you stomp over to the counter and plop down onto one of the old wooden stools. Kurogiri walks over calmly to ask if he can make you a drink.

“Yes, please.” The politeness sounded forced, but at least you’d somehow remembered your manners even through the whirlwind of emotions rampaging through you. You stare at the man’s misty form as he walked away, trying to make out a pattern to the way the purple tendrils twisted and curled as he moved. There was something off about the guy, but you could never quite figure it out. Maybe it was because he seemed more like a babysitter than an actual villain. Or maybe it was because he was the only one who rarely left the bar. Contemplating the possibilities wasn’t enough to distract you and you began to unconsciously pick at the skin on the inside of your pointer finger with your thumbnail. It was a habit that always seemed to manifest when you were on the verge of a breakdown.

You look around the bar once and find that it’s empty aside from you and the villain bartender. You weren’t sure if you were grateful for that or not. You’d been a member of the league for a while now, but you weren’t particularly close to any of them. It wasn’t as if you had a deep hatred for heroes or a passionate desire to destroy the world like the others. The one thing you did have in common was that you were a misfit that didn’t seem to belong anywhere else thanks to a quirk that had slowly driven everyone around you away. You’d agreed to help out the league with their dastardly plans in exchange for a place to just exist in peace.

“Can we put on some music or something?” You ask Kurogiri once your first drink is gone. Without saying a word, he walks over to a small radio on the shelf behind the bar and turns it on. You continue to pick at the skin on your finger as the melody of a stupid love song begins filling up the empty bar. It didn’t do anything to calm the fury in your heart. Your mind wanders to the messages you’d received from your family earlier that day. They were suddenly asking you for favors after almost a year of ignoring your attempts to reach out to them time and again. They’d distanced themselves from you just like everyone else had. You’d lost track of how many friendships you’d lost due to people’s inability to accept you the way you were. They only got in touch when they needed something from you.

You were halfway done with your second drink when the door swings open again and someone else walks into the bar, bringing in the smell of burnt flesh with them. Dabi comes into the room at a much more leisurely pace than you had and silently plants himself in the seat furthest from you. Kurogiri was already preparing the man’s usual drink.

“Why are we listening to this shit?” Dabi asks flatly while throwing an annoyed glance over to the old radio. The signal wasn’t too strong so the song kept fading into static every few minutes. Kurogiri walks over and turns the dial until finding another clear station that happened to be playing classical piano. “Awesome… thanks.” The sarcasm in his voice was palpable. You quickly down the rest of your second drink.

Dabi had always been intimidating to you. He had deep purple burn scars covering half his face, most of his arms, and a bit of what you’d seen of his chest, plus he was a dangerous murderer. None of those things were what really got to you though. You knew that everyone in the league had killed at some point, but at least most of them had been somewhat friendly to you. Even if Toga was a bit much for your taste, she’d still jumped at the chance to make a new friend when you had showed up. Twice was always good for a laugh too. You’d even had some interesting conversations with Spinner and Mr. Compress. Dabi though, he always kept to himself. And there was always something so distant and cold about his intense blue stare that made him difficult to even approach, let alone talk to.

“Would you like another one?” Kurogirl picks up your empty glass.

“Yeah.” You glance back over at Dabi, feeling a sudden urge to move. You weren’t doing nearly enough to deal with the negative emotions still running wild inside you, and they were twisting and contorting like Kurogiri’s mist, trying to force you into finding a more effective way to express them. You look around the bar once, wondering how mad Shigaraki would be if you tore through the place until you’d destroyed enough to tire yourself out. That was probably out of the question. You hop off your barstool and walk over to Dabi. Maybe he wasn’t that bad. You climb up onto the seat right next to him.

“Hey.”

He turns his head to meet your gaze with a bored expression. Being this close to him felt dangerous, yet exciting. The smell of burned skin was stronger up close, and you had no idea if it was from overusing his self-destructive fire quirk, or from the people he’d undoubtedly turned into victims that day. Kurogiri walks over and puts your new drink in front of you. You take a sip and find it cold and refreshing.

“Did you need something?” Dabi asks. It was a question but it sounded very dismissive. You decide to ignore your urge to run away.

“I’m bored,” You shrug. Dabi only raises his eyebrows slightly before turning away from you.

“Not my problem.” He says.

“Come on,” You weren’t backing down. “We could go scare little kids by popping out of dark alleys or something.” Dabi swings his head back around to face you with a scowl, only to find you grinning playfully back. Kurogiri’s drinks had made you brave.

“That’s your idea of fun, huh?” Dabi asks.

“It’s an idea,” you confess. “I’m open to suggestions if you have a better one.” The villain just continues to stare at you with his eyes alight with irritation and just a hint of confusion. You’d never spoken to him before except short polite greetings, so the behavior you were exhibiting now was probably throwing him off just a bit.

“Fine,” you sigh while waving your hand toward the radio which was still playing the same slow piano music, “do you fancy a dance?”

“No.” He actually sounded kind of pissed now.

“Wanna fight then?” You quickly change tactics and the look of surprise on his face was extremely satisfying. It was the first time you’d seen him express any sort of emotion aside from irritation or apathy. “Not to the death or anything,” you give him another cheesy smile. “Just a friendly little match.”

“No.” He turns away again which causes you to panic because you didn’t want him ignoring you. Without thinking, you reach out to grab his arm. Dabi goes stiff and his eyes slide back to meet yours. You’d really caught him off guard this time. You look down at your hand, thinking that you should probably let him go but not actually wanting to. The burned skin under your fingers felt different than you expected. It felt leathery, but wasn’t as coarse as it looked. You rub your thumb back and forth over his forearm a couple times, marveling at the warmth it radiated due to his quirk.

You finally glance back at his face to find all his features dead aside from his blue eyes which simmered with mysterious emotions. You got the impression that if you said or did the wrong thing, he might just drag you outside and turn you into a pile of ash. That didn’t actually sound so bad. Maybe it was all right to keep pushing your luck. Your eyes drop from his eyes to his mouth. His whole lower lip and jaw were scarred with the same deep purple burns. The staples holding his damaged flesh together ran from the corners of his mouth, along his cheeks, and up towards his ears. You lean in towards him and peek back up at his eyes. The life you’d seen in them just a moment ago had been locked away, and now his stare was flat and guarded.

“So, we’re doing this now?” He asks in a low voice. Even though you’d never intended for things to go this way, you were glad that you finally had his attention.

“Is that a problem?” You smile back, batting your eyelashes once flirtatiously. His expression doesn’t change much.

“Guess not,” He shrugs before grabbing his drink off the bar with his free hand and chugging it down.

You continue to exam his face for a moment, letting your eyes wander over the burn marks under his eyes and the small piercings on the side of his nose. You were close enough to smell the liquor on his breath now and you drag your hand up his arm to grab his shoulder and pull him closer. You glance over to check on Kurogiri, but he was no longer in the room. You wonder how the misty man must think of you now that he’d witnessed your shameless attempts to use Dabi as a way to avoid your feelings.

“Are we doing this or what?” Dabi’s voice pulls your attention back and you catch a glimpse of uncertainty in the depths of his blue eyes. The reality of what you’re doing hits you suddenly like a ton of bricks. You grimace at your own actions and pull away from Dabi as fast as possible. You cover your face with your hands and let out a groan.

“Ugh!” You shake your head before looking at the man in front of you to see anger written in his glowering eyes and scowling lips. “Jeez, I’m an idiot. I shouldn’t have done that.” The fury on Dabi’s face intensifies, making you feel even worse. Without saying another word, he hops off the barstool and storms out. The crushing weight of your guilt settles in your chest and you put your head down on the bar. What was wrong with you? Even if you hadn’t really interacted with Dabi much before, he was still a member of the group that had taken you in and accepted you. If he or Kurogiri decided to tell Shigaraki about what you’d just done, you might end up back on your own or dead. Your very bad day had just gotten a whole lot worse.

[lana-b-bana]

Dinner & Diatribes (Part 1)

Summary: Cordelia arrives at Outpost 3 to take care of some loose ends, but during that time, she finds herself attracted to Ms. Wilhemina Venable. However, Wilhemina doesn’t seem to return her feelings—she detests Cordelia, in fact. They try to go their separate ways, but a fateful evening encounter leaves them both wanting more.

A/N: I have not watched Season 8, so I messed around with the plot! All the witches are alive in this (besides the witches Michael brought back). Also, thanks to the wonderful @shineestark for clarifying the plot and for motivating me! There is some smut in this, so be warned! I’m just here spreading the #LetWilheminaBottom Gospel! Anyway, this is just my chance for me to write some enemies-to-lovers, so enjoy !

---

“More than anything I was relieved that in my unfamiliar babbling-and-wanting-to-talk state I'd stopped myself from blurting the thing I'd never said, even though it was something we both knew well enough without me saying out loud to him in the street - which was, of course, I love you.” — The Goldfinch, Donna Tartt.

---

It was a shame men were so egotistic, Cordelia mused as she transmuted herself back to the Outpost she had gotten so accustomed to. If the Hawthorne School for Exceptional Young Men hadn’t insisted on Michael taking the test of the Seven Wonders—if Michael didn’t even exist—things would’ve been so much easier. Now here she was, ready to administer the test to a boy with a beautiful smile but threatening eyes who could possibly be the first male Supreme. 

The Supreme. 

The title brings no joy. Instead of a certain dark relish that was familiar to her mother, all Cordelia feels is a quiet bind to duty. She has to be the flawless figurehead of the coven; any other choice would bring shame to her girls, not to mention herself. 

Now, seeing what the Supremacy has given her (nothing but death), there was no reason to celebrate such a vain title without acknowledging the end of the road. But death is nothing to be scared of. Not anymore. 

Death, duty, and a fierce love for her girls makes the Supremecy worth it. After the war has ended, and the dust has settled, what is left for her? 

Enough of that. Cordelia straightens her shoulders as she strides into a room where Michael and his mentors wait. Cordelia is flanked by Myrtle and Zoe, but God, if she doesn’t feel alone at this moment. “Are we ready to begin, gentlemen?”

“Why, of course.” Michael smiles at her. Chills creep up her spine. “Shall I pick up any more of your friends?”

Cordelia ignores his not-so-subtle jab about her failures. “Whenever you’re ready.” In another world, there would be no need for him to even ask such a question, but then again, she wouldn’t be the Supreme. Her heart clenches again—pain is all she seems to feel lately—but the sound of a door banging open drags her out of her thoughts.

“What is the meaning of this?” Cordelia should have been accustomed to the shock of seeing an eyeful of purple, yet she still smirks when Wilhemina catches everyone’s attention. “I asked a question, and I demand an answer.” 

Cordelia doesn’t have eyes in the back of her head, but she can practically see the warlocks exchange glances. And of course, it falls on her to be the bearer of bad news. “May I speak to you outside, Miss Venable?”

She sniffs before leading the way out of the room. “You may.” 

Outside, a couple of greys are milling around, but with a pointed glare, Wilhemina sends them scrambling away. Cordelia can’t help but be impressed by the effectiveness of Wilhemina’s methods to rule, even though they are vastly different from hers. But opposites attract, do they not?

“Must I ask again? I would hate to think you have the same lowly behaviorisms as the rest of the imbeciles in the room, but then again, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Cordelia arches her eyebrow, not sure if she was amused by her sharp tongue, or irritated because of her rudeness. Both, perhaps. A mixture of both. “My apologies for intruding on your territory, Miss Venable, but there is a test I need to administrate to Mr. Langdon. It is convenient for everyone to gather here.” 

Wilhemina’s lips press together. “Yes, how convenient to give me no explanation of how you got here and to leave me out of the loop. One might think you teleported here, but that is impossible, of course.”

It takes all of Cordelia’s self-control not to smile.

Perhaps Wilhemina notices this, for she takes a step closer and glowers at Cordelia. All she does in response is allow part of a smirk onto her face, purposefully stepping into Wilhemina’s personal space. The other woman makes no attempt to move away, but her hands tighten around the head of her cane. Wilhemina is the taller of the two (but they are quite similar in height) and when she leans down, Cordelia has to stop herself from staring at the strong flex of her neck, the gentle curve into her jawline. 

“If you cause any trouble, I will not hesitate to toss you out into the radiation myself. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal.” Cordelia smirks fully this time, noting that it only serves to enrage Wilhemina more.

They are close enough to kiss. 

That thought makes something, something flare in Cordelia’s eyes, perhaps a dark pleasure, but whatever it is, it forces Wilhemina to swallow and turn on her heel. 

“Good evening, Miss Venable!” Cordelia can’t help but call after her. No response follows. She stares at Wilhemina’s retreating back, feeling the tension between them simmer and hover before quietly wilting away, just waiting for another chance to be rekindled again. Caution should be used, but still ... how fun.

---

A week ago, Michael passed the test of Seven Wonders. Cordelia has spent much of that time in her guest chambers, where the bed is too springy and the room is too cold for her liking. Still, anything is better than walking into the warlocks’ smug faces and the little taunts from Michael. It’s hard to believe he’s the next Supreme—not because she wants to keep her power, but because there is something off about him. 

Cordelia spends most of her time with her Council, planning, or arguing rather, over their next moves. Myrtle is the strongest voice against letting Michael be the Supreme. “Oh, little bird, I’m sure he has evil down to his little toe! We can’t let him be the next Supreme; we’ll all die!”

Surprisingly, Mallory had agreed with Myrtle. Actually, everyone else except Cordelia had firmly said that Michael was not fit to rule. She had shaken her head and mentioned Fiona, how she would rather die than end up like her. That had quieted them before her girls shuffled out the room. “I do hope you know what you’re doing,” was all Myrtle said before left. 

Honestly? She had no idea.

A growl from her stomach makes Cordelia realize it’s time for dinner. She couldn’t stay hibernated in her room forever, and she has to face Michael at some point. With a deep exhale, she squares her shoulders and heads to the dining hall. It is her duty, after all.

Cordelia is the last to arrive by the looks of the taken seats and the weight of many eyes swiveling to her. She simply nods and smiles which stiffens slightly when she sees the only available seat. The seat at the head of the table, on Wilhemina’s left. Fantastic.

Wilhemina looks bored with the whispers that follow Cordelia and her coven, but when she approaches her, a glint shines in her eyes. “Good evening, Miss Goode. I see you’re finally ready to come out of hiding.”

Cordelia keeps her smile polite as she sits down, her arm barely brushing with Wilhemina’s. “And I see your vision isn’t entirely clear. What a shame, I was quite looking forward to getting to know you, but I presume you can’t tell me much about my appearance, hmm?”

It’s a low blow to toss Wilhemina’s ignorance right back in her face, but judging by the way she gripped her fork, it certainly works. Or, it partly did. “What I can tell you about your deceiving appearance is that you are a crooked enigma, an entitled, arrogant, rude, high-and-mighty failure as a leader with the worst fashion sense and hairdo I have ever seen!” She hisses the words out, and there is no amusement in them. Just pure anger.

For a moment, Cordelia opens her mouth, ready to start a full-out brawl. There is white-hot anger simmering in her veins at the job to her leadership, something she always prided herself on. She would die for her coven, her girls at the drop of a word. Yes, she led them to the end of the world, but god damn if she wasn’t going to get them out of it. 

Cordelia manages to smirk, tempering down her anger with a comment she knew would frustrate Wilhemina even more. “I could say—and I do see—the same for you, Miss Venable.” 

The pits of Wilhemina’s eyes are black, blazing like coals. A shiver rises up in Cordelia, but before she can move, Wilhemina bangs her cane on the ground and stands up in one fluid motion, looking down on Cordelia. Literally. “Miss Goode, I want you outside. Now.”

“Well, since you asked so politely.” Sarcasm colours Cordelia’s voice as she tries to ignore the chills running through her body at Wilhemina’s strict tone. Just when she thinks she has her all figured out, Cordelia always manages to be surprised. Perhaps that’s part of dear Wilhemina’s charm.

She doesn’t have time to ponder her sudden familiarity, as Wilhemina turns and take a long stride toward Cordelia when they are in a private hallway. The furious look is back in her eyes, and she pushes a finger into Cordelia’s shoulder. “You! You are such a pest in my outpost! Everywhere I turn, you are there, whispering and planning. Tell me, what are you planning? I know it involves the men”—she says this in such a disgusted tone—“but any ideas fail me! Tell me, or I’ll toss you outside right this instant!” 

Her voice is low, but it quickly becomes louder and sharper as she progresses with her rant. Cordelia feels bad for Wilhemina, she really does, but she can’t say anything that would make sense. Supremes, magic, and teleportation. All things a lunatic would say.

“Well?” Wilhemina thumps her cane, glaring at Cordelia. “Are you going to answer me, Miss Goode?”

“No. I won’t.” Cordelia lifts her chin, wanting to savor the sweet taste of defiance, and instead running various excuses through her mind. How could she get out of this problem now?

Wilhemina growls and this is it, this is the moment that Cordelia will have to use her magic or restrain her, except—

Wilhemina presses their lips together, capturing Cordelia’s bottom lip into her mouth a moment later. It takes a hard bite for Cordelia to kiss back, teeth clashing together in the midst of their furious battle. She manages to back Wilhemina up until she’s against the wall, and even though her mind is clouded with lust, she keeps her hands behind Wilhemina’s back so she doesn’t slam into the cold wall. 

She flinches at Cordelia’s wandering hands and breaks apart to put her hands on Cordelia’s shoulders. She thinks Wilhemina is going to push her away, but she pulls closer until their bodies are pressed together, not even a sliver of an inch left. 

“Take my jacket off,” Wilhemina mumbles in between kisses. Cordelia manages to bring her half-lidded eyes up to Wilhemina, questioning without words. Are you sure?

“Well, are you going to make yourself useful for once, or I will have to do it?” Her arrogant tone is back, and Cordelia tugs sharply at her neat jacket until the buttons are spilling off, rolling away on the floor. 

“That was my favourite jacket, you idiot—”

“Shut up.” This, Cordelia hisses out as a desire to leave Wilhemina wordless, gasping for words consumes her. She doesn’t bother to remove her belt—only shoves it up—and sticks a hand down her skirt, into her underwear. 

They both gasp at how wet Wilhemina is. “Christ, Wilhemina, you’re practically dripping.” A bit of pride enters Cordelia’s voice, enough for her to almost forget that she’s just as aroused as Wilhemina. 

“Did I—” She let outs a gasp when Cordelia ever-so-slowly inserts her pointer finger inside her. Already, Wilhemina is clenching around her finger, and Cordelia lowly chuckles, lowering her mouth to her neck. “Did you say something, darlin’?”

“Did I ... give you permission to address me by my first name?” Wilhemina shakily exhales when Cordelia scraps her teeth on her jawline. She weaves her hands into Cordelia’s hair, tugging when she feels teeth biting down the same spot. 

“Mmm, I think you did when you kissed me and told me to undress you.”

“It was hardly undressing, just taking my jacket off. Just ... shut up and fuck me already, Miss Goode.”

Cordelia chuckles and focuses her attention on Wilhemina’s lovely neck. She leaves a few kisses before she bites, leaving a large hickey. “Say please.” 

Wilhemina bites down on her lips to try to stop herself from making noise. Cordelia tsks and gives a sharp thrust with her finger. “I wanna hear you. At least say my name.” 

A cry manages to escape Wilhemina’s lips, loud enough for someone passing to hear. The thought only spurs Cordelia on, and she thrusts again. “Say it, Wilhemina. Say my name.” 

Wilhemina’s voice catches when she moans, “Cordelia, fuck me.”

Cordelia smirks and keeps her hands still. “Say please.”

“Fuck! Cordelia, please, please fuck me!” She pulls on Cordelia’s hair again, trying to move her hips to gain friction. 

Cordelia chuckles, thriving on how easily Wilhemina is bending to her orders. “Isn’t ‘fuck’ such a coarse word, my dear?” she asks while slowly pumping her finger in and out of Wilhemina. 

“What ... what else do you think we’re doing? We’re not making love,” Wilhemina spits that out with scorn, her eyes glinting the exact time Cordelia deflates a little. “I hate you, Cordelia. Get that in your mind. This is a fuck because I want it, not some love idiocy. It’s too bad that’s what you thought because you were doing so well—”

“Be quiet.” Cordelia growls, fury filling her because yes, that’s exactly what she thought, that Wilhemina has some feelings for her and she’s too stubborn to admit it because fuck, Cordelia likes her. Really likes her.

“Make me.”

And she does. Cordelia pushes in another finger, and Wilhemina takes it incredibly well if the wetness dripping onto Cordelia’s fingers is any indication. Cordelia starts thrusting fast, reveling in the obscene squelching sound her two fingers make. 

“I-I’m close.” Wilhemina’s earlier arrogance is gone, replaced by a wild want of a release. “Don’t stop.”

“Oh, I should. I should get you back for being so horrible to me. I should stop you right here, on the edge of your climax, and make you beg again for me. Look at you, riding my fingers, dear Wilhemina, so needy and wet. I won’t, though because I—”

Wilhemina cuts her off with a desperate kiss, and Cordelia barely manages to catch the look in her eyes. It’s apprehension, it’s desire, it’s something like guilt, or perhaps it’s a combination of the three.

Their kiss is open-mouthed, and Cordelia tastes dark cherries—is it Wilhemina’s lipstick or hot breath? She’s not sure; she’s completely swept up in the feeling of Wilhemina jerking against her fingers and the load of wetness that drenches Cordelia’s hand. Wilhemina manages to muffle her moan into Cordelia’s mouth, but there is no hiding the way she claws at Cordelia, tugging her even closer than they are.

Perhaps them breathing together is the most intimate part of all this. Their chests heave at the same time, and every time they gasp or moan or grunt, they are literally breathing into each other’s lungs. If Cordelia can concentrate, she can almost feel a part of Wilhemina’s soul flying into her heart through their connected mouths. She’s not sure if it’s magic, but it is heaven and hell at the same time. 

They part slowly, lips first. Wilhemina, her lipstick smudged, drags her eyes open, and the delicate shyness there steals Cordelia’s heart away. “Why ... how could ...” She trails off, and Cordelia busies herself with fixing Wilhemina’s belt, combing back some stray hairs, and smoothing down her skirt. She keeps her touch light and gentle as she cups Wilhemina’s cheek, smiling gently at her. “Would you be alright if I went to go grab your cane, darling?” 

At her nod of agreement, Cordelia takes two steps to where Wilhemina’s cane rolled away in their ... actions and picks it up, covering Wilhemina’s hands with hers over the head of it. The warmth of her hands hopefully soaks into Wilhemina’s as they stand quietly, simply looking into each other’s eyes. Her customary awareness bleeds back in Wilhemina’s eyes, and Cordelia wishes that the unguardedness she saw—the bashful delight—makes a home there, someplace else from Cordelia’s heart. 

Wilhemina is the first to break the silence. “Don’t you have dinner to go to? Or shall we stand here tenderly and gaze?”

Cordelia chuckles. Her anger from before melts away at a simple jibe, and she smiles. “I certainly have ... satisfied my appetite, my dear. I certainly don’t mind during the latter though.” 

To her delight, a blush blooms on Wilhemina’s cheeks. Though she is the epitome of prim and proper once again, ignoring her appearance, the afterglow effects seem to be working in Cordelia’s favour. “Yes, well, I. I must return to see if the miscreants are revolting in my absence. Will you be joining me?” 

She shakes her head no, the call of silence and thought about their evening together too strong to resist. (Though, it’s not as if she would do any thinking besides the feeling of Wilhemina’s skin.)

“Ah. Good evening, then, Miss Goode.” Wilhemina looks vaguely disappointed a moment before turning to leave for the dining hall.

“Wilhemina,” Cordelia calls softly after her. 

She stops and does not turn around, merely moving her head an inch to the right. Cordelia wishes she would turn around to meet her gaze that says everything her mouth doesn’t. “I look forward to seeing you tomorrow at dinner again,” is what comes out.

Wilhemina nods and continues on without a word. The words that linger with Cordelia are “I hate you”, uttered by the same woman who rips Cordelia to shreds carelessly with her words, yet allows her to piece herself back together with her touch. 

I hate you.

Somehow, Cordelia doesn’t believe that at all.

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